Countdown to Impact
by PlayPrayDie
Summary: Everyone hides who they really are, in the end. Make everyone in the world a Wesen, and people will just learn to lie about something else. (AU: There's No Such Thing as Human)
1. Innocence is the Kindest Lie

This is an AU I've been thinking about for a while now.

The premise idea came about from wondering what the world would be like if there were _no humans_, if everyone was _Wesen_- what would things be like? How different would things be? For society _and_ for Nick?

I had a lot of fun writing this. Hope you have as much fun reading it.

* * *

When Nick was four, his best friend had feathers.

She was his first friend, too. His aunt had learned that he didn't play with the other kids, so she brought him and introduced him to her friend's family. And all of them had feathers and beaks and intense, sharp eyes, and he met Lottie. And Lottie was imperious and always got what she wanted, but that meant that it didn't matter that he didn't know how to play like she did, because she just grabbed him by the hand and dragged him with her anyways. And she didn't mind instructing him on what he was doing wrong when he told her he didn't know how to play a game she wanted to.

x

When Nick and Lottie were six, they went to school together.

It seemed like some of the children just wanted to pick on him, and never gave him a chance. But Lottie always stood up for him, and shot down the mean ones, and even pecked at them with her sharp little beak if they gave her the excuse.

It seemed like some of the children just wanted to pick on everyone. There were others, ones that Lottie impatiently told him were prey which meant they were born victims, whatever that meant. And the mean ones picked on them a lot, too.

Nick thought that meant he was prey, too. And that he should have been able to get along with them.

But none of them would even look at him.

When he finally asked his homeroom teacher why Lottie was the only person who liked him, Mr. Cauler looked down at him with sad cherry red eyes and told him that he was a very sweet boy, and that maybe he should ask his parents.

When Nick tried, they told him they would tell him when he was older.

One day, there was a boy with long ears and soft white fur and a twitchy little nose, and he was crying in the corner of the playground as a bunch of kids with scales kicked a ball at the wall just above his head. Whenever he tried to run and escape, they would kick it right into his path, sometimes hitting him head-on.

The boy's fur was so perfectly pretty and white that when the ball hit the boy's nose, and blood started to stain that fur, it made Nick feel like he was going to throw up.

He looked at the mean children and he wanted to hit them. To punch and kick and bite and tear until they all had bloody noses, until they all cowered in the corner. He wanted to stand over them and laugh at them and spit on them until they apologized and crawled away crying.

A few seconds later, his heart broke. What was he thinking?

You didn't hurt others, even if they were cruel and stupid. Those were bad thoughts. He shouldn't want to do that.

And when you did something bad, you were supposed to be punished for it.

He had walked forward and planted himself between the scaly kids and the poor boy. And when they kept kicking the ball at him, screaming at Nick, he just wrapped himself around the boy with the white fur so that all the mean ones could hit was his back, and he tolerated it. He tolerated it until he heard the shouts of adults, and the scaly kids scattering.

The boy told Nick that his name was Raleigh, and Nick told Raleigh that his name was Nick, and they smiled at eachother and talked in the nurse's office until Lottie ran in and hugged Nick and told him she'd heard what happened and that he was stupid, and he must have hurt more than he thought he did, because he just started laughing.

When Raleigh's parents came to pick him up, he introduced Nick to them and told them- with intense seriousness- that Nick had saved his life. And Nick remembered his manners and stood up, even though he hurt, and bowed to say hello. And when his own parents arrived to take him home, everyone's parents talked for a long time in the principal's office, so he and Raleigh and Lottie doodled together until they came back out and it was time to leave.

On the drive home, his dad asked him if he wanted to play with Raleigh again. And Nick was so excited that he almost hurt his back worse by bouncing in his seat.

That weekend, Raleigh's parents came to visit Lottie's. And Nick got to stay over and play with his new friend, and they all had dinner together, and Nick and Lottie both fell asleep on the new boy's fuzzy shoulders, and Raleigh was smiling so much it looked like his cheeks were kind of stuck like that.

x

When Nick was eight, his parents went on a business trip.

They left him in his aunt Marie's care, which meant that he practically got to stay with Lottie, because Marie was all kissy with one of her uncles. And because Raleigh's family had moved into a house on the same block, they got to play together every day, and Nick had never been happier.

One day at school, though, someone drew a weird thing on his desk with big black sharpie. When the teacher saw it, he got really angry, and Nick wound up in the principal's office even though he hadn't done anything wrong. And the principal asked him a lot of things- he was a lot nicer than anyone else seemed to think he was. He wanted to know how Nick was doing in school, and whether or not he liked it there, and what his favorite class was, and how he got along with his friends, and Nick happily told him about all the fun things he was doing and how much he loved art class and how he was going to be friends with Raleigh and Lottie forever. And the man was smiling, but it was kind of sad, just like all the adults who looked at him.

When Nick asked what the symbol was that someone had drawn on his desk, the Principal adjusted his hooves and asked what Nick thought it meant. And Nick told him, honestly, that a lot of people didn't like to tell him things because they thought he was too young, and that he knew the teachers all knew- and that the Principal did, too. He knew it was someone trying to bully him again, because if one of his friends had wanted to leave him a picture, they would have done it on paper and hidden it in his desk, not done it on top. And the fact that he was in the man's office right now meant that it was something pretty bad, since it hadn't been left up to the teacher to handle.

The Principal told him he was a very clever boy. Nick shrugged and said that when nobody talks to you, you learn to pay more attention to what they don't say than what they do.

When aunt Marie came to pick him up, she looked scary, and nobody would look at her. But the Principal gave him a piece of candy and told him that being clever would help him a lot, and Nick thanked him because he seemed like he didn't hate Nick at all. When he went home, he drew a picture of the symbol.

He asked during dinner. It seemed like the best time to do it, because that meant none of the adults could just walk out on him. He waited until everyone was served and just starting to eat, and when Lottie's mom asked him how school had been, he asked her what the symbol meant.

Everyone at dinner had stopped eating except for Lottie. When her mom finally found her voice again, she sounded kind of scared when she asked where Nick had seen that. Lottie told everyone that someone had snuck into the class before it started and drawn it on Nick's desk, and everyone freaked out and Nick got the day off.

When Aunt Marie reached over and took away his picture, Nick was still confused. But when she tore it up, Nick's heart was in his throat.

Everyone was lying to him and they wouldn't even tell him what was wrong and his aunt had torn up his picture she had torn up his picture she had torn it up-

He wanted to take all of her precious photos and tear them up and smash all their glass. He wanted to take every page out of her precious books and burn them.

Nick was so angry it scared him.

He didn't even ask to be excused. He slipped out of his chair and ran out the door.

He didn't know where he was running to. Out. Away. Somewhere else. Not there.

He had to get away. He was still so angry at her, he didn't want to look at her.

He kept running until he was lost, and cold, and he remembered that he wasn't wearing any shoes because his feet hurt and they had all sorts of little pebbles and twigs that had tried to stab him. They were muddy and sore, and he remembered that he hadn't eaten anything, and he was completely and totally lost. There were tears in his eyes, even though he wasn't sad- it was like he'd been crying because he was so angry.

When he tried to trace his path back- thinking that maybe he could at least find Raleigh's house- he couldn't even figure out which direction he had come from. Finally, when he turned a corner, there were lots of lights and people down one of the streets, so he wandered down it, thinking maybe it would wind up looking familiar.

A lot of people stared at him as he walked past. Nick hated feeling self-conscious, but he knew he must have looked pathetic, with his bare feet and his muddy pants and the tear trails down his cheeks.

A man finally stopped him. He had lots of thick black fur and big black eyes, and he was wearing a policeman's uniform. When he asked Nick if he was okay, and where his parents were, Nick could barely find his voice. But finally, he told the man that he was lost, and the policeman picked him up and carried him piggy-back so that his feet would get a break, and took him back to the police station.

There were lots of people there, all busy and bustling around, and when the man gave him a blanket and a cup of hot chocolate and told Nick that his name was Mr. Silberman, Nick managed to smile. Mr. Silberman asked why he was outside alone so late, and Nick admitted that he ran away, and when he asked why he'd done that, Nick said that his aunt was being mean to him, and he just ran out the door, but when he finally decided to come back, he already didn't know where he was.

Mr. Silberman was nice, and he showed Nick around the station and introduced him to the rest of his team. And one of the guys had pizza, and gave Nick a slice, and they washed up his feet and bandaged them.

His aunt showed up an hour later. He had loads of fun coloring until then, but when she walked through the door, he hid the pictures. What if she tried to rip them up again?

She knelt down in front of him and apologised for scaring him. And Nick mumbled that it was okay, and he shouldn't have run out. And she told him that he was right, he shouldn't have, but it was all okay now, and if he didn't do it again, then she would know he'd learned his lesson.

He said goodbye to all the nice police and when his aunt was talking to someone, he slipped back and gave the pictures he'd done to Mr. Silberman, because he didn't think he would rip them up. And Mr. Silberman gave him a hug, and Nick finally went home.

When he got back, he practically passed out on the couch, but he woke up when he heard Raleigh's parents come over. And when he heard Raleigh's mom crying, he managed to get up and stumble into the room to ask her where it hurt, because he could try and kiss it better if she wanted, and she just gathered him up into her fur and hugged him. And she rocked him there for long enough that he fell asleep in her arms.

x

When Nick was ten, he first heard the word Grimm.

It was in class. They were doing a research project in the library.

When he came across a mention of Woging, he was going to ask the teacher what it meant, but he had the resource at his fingertips. Why not just look it up?

When he did, he was kind of confused. According to the book he'd found it in, it seemed like people had one face and then another one when they got angry or scared. And their normal face looked just like his, but their other one was the one he was used to seeing. Did that mean all the people he saw were angry and scared all the time?

He asked Lottie about it, and in her usual imperious way, she told him all about it, how it worked, and everything. He listened, and when she was done, he told both of his friends that he saw them Woged all the time.

Raleigh tried to tell him that was impossible. Nick just shrugged it off, and asked why it was so impossible. And Raleigh got really quiet, and his eyes got really wide. And when Nick started to get worried, Raleigh asked if he'd ever Woged, himself.

Nick didn't even have to consider it. He shook his head. He hadn't even known what it was until just that moment.

Raleigh told him, right then and there. That the ones who couldn't Woge when they were little usually developed it later on in life, and they were only the strongest and rarest of all the races out there. That the older you were when your beast woke up, the more powerful you were. And that he'd only ever heard of one kind of rare and powerful person who saw everyone's secret faces all the time.

A Grimm.

Nick didn't even know the term. When he asked what it was, Lottie was watching him closely, and she told Raleigh that Grimms were myths, they were silly stories cooked up so parents could scare their kids into behaving. But then Raleigh pointed out how tentative both of their families were about Nick's parents, and Lottie finally admitted that it seemed like there had been a big fuss when she was little about his aunt and her uncle getting together, one that didn't make much sense to her at the time.

Nick managed to find a storybook on Grimms. And then another. And another.

The Grimms, the Grimms, who come in the night to slay the unwary. The Mad Grimms, to whom even the highest predator is nothing but prey. The black-hearted Grimms, who torture and kill without a second thought. The Grimms without empathy, or decency, or kindness. The Grimms who scorched and burned the land, who cut off heads and stuck them on spikes, who made homes for themselves among the ashes. The monstrous Grimms, the horrifying Grimms, the terrible, awful, insane Grimms.

Nick didn't hear when the teacher called everyone to pack up so they could head out to lunch. He stayed in the library, reading.

He didn't think it could possibly mean him- until he stumbled across the symbol he'd seen. It was a scythe, and it was the sign for The Reapers of the Grimms. People whose entire lives revolved around killing Grimms to try and save everyone from them.

Because Grimms were evil.

He felt the book he was reading fall out of his nerveless fingers- almost distantly, like he was miles away from his own hands.

Was he evil?

He didn't think he was. He didn't feel evil.

Were his parents evil? Was his aunt?

But- but they didn't seem bad, they were just... his family. They were just his family.

Sure, his aunt was kind of mean, and his parents could be kind of- intimidating- but that didn't mean they were evil. Right?

When he went home that night, he stayed up late, waiting for his parents to get home. He sat on their bed, waiting for them.

When his father walked through the door, Nick looked up at him, really looked. And when his mother followed in, asking Nick what was wrong, he turned to her and did the same.

For the first time, he was actually paying attention. And he saw the scars on his mom's face, and his dad's hands. He saw the way they walked, the way he'd seen predator parents stand together. How they never wore anything but all black, and when he looked into their eyes-

How had he missed it, all that time?

His parents... he could see it so easily, now that he knew what he was looking for. He'd watched so many cartoons and read so many comic books, and always gotten fed up with the heroes when they didn't recognize the bad guys in their too-obvious disguises.

But how own parents were the bad guys. And they barely even disguised themselves at all, and yet he hadn't seen it.

He was the son of the villains.

And even though they were the bad guys- that didn't mean they didn't love him, right? They were still his parents. He was still their son.

They were evil, but they still loved him.

Nick didn't tell them he knew.

He'd stood up and hugged them both and told them he'd just had a bad dream, that was all. And his dad sat with him as his mom got him some hot chocolate, and they all sat together and read a book, and Nick's heart hurt in his chest all day and all night.

When he got back to school, he finally knew what he needed to look up in order to learn more about himself. About his family.

He didn't check out any of the books- his parents had access to the records of what he took from the library at the end of the year, after all. He would just spend his lunch hour in the library, reading in the corner.

Reading made it easier to pretend that Lottie wasn't avoiding him. That she hadn't refused to meet his eyes since they'd first found out.

There were a lot of children's storybooks and novels and things that had Grimms as the bad guys, but there wasn't much actual information on them. They just all had these ominous, silent, dark-clad, towering figures who loomed in the background and terrified everyone else in the story.

It wasn't until he started reading history books that he started to get a better idea of what was real.

Throughout history, the Grimms had been behind some of the worst things to ever happen. The amount of blood on his ancestors hands was enough to drown him, and everyone else in the school, and everyone else in the whole city.

From what little factual information he could gather, apparently Grimms could see through the veil, which let them see everyone's true faces. But that seeing too much drove them insane, and while it wasn't inevitable for a Grimm to turn into a serial killer, those who didn't tended to wind up dead or in a mental asylum.

He wanted so badly to say that he wasn't evil. That it was just his family, just his parents, not him. He wasn't going to wind up that way at all.

But then he thought back, and remembered.

He remembered how mean he had wanted to be to all the children who had been tormenting Raleigh.

He remembered how angry he had gotten with aunt Marie when she had torn up his picture.

He remembered how cruel he had been, inside his head.

Those weren't the sorts of things a good person wanted to do.

When Raleigh cornered him in the library, he managed to keep it together just long enough to get himself to the gym changing room before breaking down crying.

His friend came in and sat against the wall beside him.

There on the cold tile floor, Nick told his friend that he didn't want to be evil. He didn't want to be a Grimm. He was scared, so scared, because one day he was going to go insane and want to kill his friends, and he never ever wanted anything bad to happen to them. He hadn't even told his parents because he'd been too afraid of how they would react. They were the villains. What if they were only pretending to be good so that he wouldn't know they weren't? What if when he confronted them, they no longer had any reason to go on pretending, and they would start asking him to kill people too?

He hated crying. He was ten- and he was a Grimm. He was supposed to be some kind of terrifying thing, but here he was on the floor crying.

Raleigh told him, right then and there, that when Nick had first met him- when he'd first gotten hurt to try and help Raleigh- he'd known right then and there that it didn't matter what Nick was. Because no matter what, there was no way he wasn't a good guy.

Even if he was a Grimm. Even if he might be evil later, that didn't mean he wasn't good now.

Raleigh refused to leave his side the rest of the day.

And the next day, when the two of them saw Lottie making friends with a cat-faced girl at another table at lunch, Raleigh pulled him away so they could sit under a tree outside and enjoy the sun instead of having to watch her abandoning them.


	2. A Stone Heart can Weather the Storm

When Nick was twelve years old, one night when he came home, his aunt had packed everything he owned into a couple of suitcases. She told him they were taking a trip, just him and her.

She drove all night. Nick wanted to ask where they were going, or why they were driving so late, or why his parents weren't there, and whether he was going to miss school, but when he looked at her face, he saw how red her eyes were.

Nick was a clever boy. So instead of asking persistent questions, he curled up and pressed his forehead against the window and watched as the lights passed by outside.

When she finally stopped at a hotel, she was so tired that she could barely navigate the stairs, so he helped her up them. She barely took off her shoes and socks before she was asleep on the bed, and Nick watched her for a moment before getting ready for sleep himself.

She was a Grimm too. It had always been a lot easier for him to see it in her than in his own parents.

But if she was stealing him away in the middle of the night without any warning, it was probably because they were in danger.

He had lived two years with the thought of being evil, and being hunted down by heroes coming to try and kill them. He had worried about it for two years.

He wondered if his parents were okay.

The next morning, he woke up to Aunt Marie shaking his shoulder. She gave him a juice box and a single-serving packet of cereal and some fruit, and told him that she'd gotten them from the continental breakfast, and that she was sorry but he would have to eat the cereal without milk.

Nick didn't complain. Cereal without milk was a relatively petty thing to complain about when there were probably Reapers on their heels.

So he made sure not to complain all day. He didn't want to distract her from driving, not if that meant she might not notice a car tailing them or something. Aunt Marie wound up needing to stop and go to the bathroom before he did.

They found another hotel that night. This time, Nick didn't have to help her up the stairs.

They continued that way for a week. Barely talking to eachother except when necessary. More and more, Nick became more certain what had happened.

At the end of the first week, when they had a rest stop break for lunch, Nick finally spoke up.

"Did Reapers find us?"

Aunt Marie dropped her water bottle. It sloshed over the asphalt of the street, and Nick found his gaze focused on it instead of on her.

It had taken her a long time to gather herself. To gather her thoughts. But finally, she answered him.

"We have more enemies than just Reapers." she had replied.

Nick had taken that to heart. Along with the knowledge that he still knew so little about who or what around him might wish him harm. But there was a far more important question that he had to ask right now.

"Are mom and dad dead?" he had barely been able to force out the words.

His aunt had been silent.

Then, she reached around and hugged him. Wrapped an arm around his shoulders and drew him in close to her side.

Funny how the first time she didn't really lie to him was the last time he would have really wanted her to.

"Yes."

Nick hadn't even really been able to cry. It hadn't been in him.

It felt so distant. So far away. His parents were dead, killed by their enemies, and now he was on the run with his aunt.

He'd thought something like this might happen for two years. He'd been bracing himself for two years for the news- that one or more of his family had either gotten on the news by being murdered in a particularly brutal way, or by being the one doing the particularly brutal murdering.

The former had caught up to them before the latter.

Nick had silently climbed back into the car. Watched the fields and the trees go by outside the window as aunt Marie drove.

Every day so far, they'd driven from seven in the morning to ten at night.

Today, she stopped at a hotel at eight.

She was the one who spoke up first this time.

"If you knew," she began, "If you knew, all this time, you must have heard some pretty terrible things about our family."

Nick just nodded.

"Why didn't you say anything?" she asked.

"Why didn't any of you?" he countered.

"We didn't know how you would respond." she placated. "Nick, you've always been such a sweet and gentle boy. We didn't know whether or not you would accept it, or if you would panic and turn the rest of us in."

Nick's heart clenched in his chest.

"I'm not sweet." he muttered. "And I'm not gentle."

When he glanced up at his aunt in the silence, she had a sad smile on her lips.

"Yes you are." she shook her head. "Nicky, we thought we had good reason to worry. You didn't have a great track record of reacting to things by standing up to them."

What? He'd cowered and run, in their eyes? Was that it?

He had done those things to try and punish himself for being bad- and to protect other people from him.

But if that was all she could see- if that was the extent of how she saw him- then he didn't have the heart to shatter her mistaken impression.

Instead, he spoke again.

"Well I didn't turn anyone in." he whispered. "But mom and dad are still dead."

She winced at that. Slowly, she nodded.

"I know." she sounded so lost when she spoke. "And I won't lie to you, things won't be easy for a little while. We have to move around a bit to make sure the people who killed them can't find us. And you..." she trailed off, sounding lost.

"Me?" his heart was in his throat. This had been what he'd always feared- what he'd always been dreading. That when someone in his family found out that he knew, they would ask him to become a killer, too.

"I need to teach you how to survive." Marie murmured. And when she caught sight of the look on his face- "I know I'm being unfair to you, but-"

"Does that mean you want me to hunt, too?" he whispered. And when Marie blinked- "I don't have to- you know. Help you murder, right?"

A couple of seconds passed. Then, she pulled him in close, drawing him into her side.

"No." she murmured. "No, of course not, sweetie. But if one of our enemies is coming after you, I'd rather you knew to protect yourself, rather than your only option being to run."

That sounded like the thing they'd talked about in history class. That thing called a slippery slope.

But he knew she was right. What if Reapers came when she was exhausted after the day's drive and couldn't fend them off?

Aunt Marie was the only family he had, now. He had to protect her.

When he went to sleep that night, he felt hollow and cold. He thought about Raleigh and his family, and how the other boy had been his best friend. He thought about Lottie's uncle and how he had been in love with Marie. And they'd just been forced to pack up and leave, never to be seen again.

He wanted to cry for his parents. He wanted to cry for himself, for having lost them.

But all he felt inside was empty.

x

When Nick was thirteen, his aunt Marie gave him his first gun.

He'd been practicing all year. Marie had been taking care of his homeschooling in a little cabin they'd been living in for a while now. Without friends, and with the threat of imminent death, it wasn't that hard to motivate himself.

He was a Grimm. He didn't want to be, he didn't like to be, but he was.

And training with his aunt- he felt closer to her than he ever had before when he put a trio of bullets into the bullseye of a target and turned around to see her grinning.

She taught him plenty of other things, as well. Bows and arrows, maces and morningstars, swords and clubs- she had what she called a basic armory in the back of her car.

The cabin was close enough to town that they could go shopping, but far enough into the wild that they could hunt for food as well.

On his birthday, she gave him a saber cutlass the width of three fingers to carry on one hip and and an M1911 pistol on the other. And she told him he'd made her so proud.

x

When Nick was fourteen, she left him.

She told him that she needed to go back to new york. That she'd left something important there, something she needed to get back.

She left him with a family of Fuchsbau- he had been hard at work learning all of the different names of the different types of people- who owed her a favor for saving their clan.

Nick made sure to mind his manners, and to be compassionate and helpful. The Fuchsbau were a good, kind family after all, and they were going to all the trouble of letting a young Grimm stay with them. He wanted to make sure they didn't feel like they were in any danger from him.

So he helped move boxes from the main house to the studio and back, and when it was time for dinner he always set the table and washed the dishes afterwards, and he helped the two little daughters do their homework and get ready for school in the mornings. And more than anything, he made certain to stay out from underfoot.

When aunt Marie came back two weeks later hauling a trailer behind her truck, the little girls cried and said they didn't want him to go until he kissed their foreheads and read them to sleep. And the older Fuchsbau told him and his aunt that any time he needed someone to take care of him, they would be happy to, because he was such a kind and helpful little boy.

Yet more people who thought he was kind.

Nick was starting to wonder if maybe it wasn't that he actually was as sweet as they thought, and instead they were just expecting something dreadful from him because he was a Grimm. Maybe they had such low standards when it came to him that any generosity at all was interpreted as saintliness.

Aunt Marie drove him away in the truck.

That night, they slept in the trailer, and she told him to think of it like a cocoon, or the shell of an egg. It had a hard shell on the outside, but on the inside, it had everything he needed in order to learn. To grow up big and strong. She told him that it would be his home from then on.


	3. More to Patience than Waiting

When Nick was fifteen, he got enrolled in high school.

He couldn't take his sword and his gun, but his aunt had taught him everything she knew about hand-to-hand combat. And she bought him a set of tactical pen knives that meant he had to learn how to use a syringe to drain out all the ink from one cartridge and fill it up with poison instead. He had a dozen of them that he kept on him at all times, for emergencies.

He had a group of friends that he ate lunch with. But none of them were close enough for him to have seen the inside of any of their homes. He focused on his grades and making sure that he didn't get in trouble. The school wasn't outright allowed to ask what your race was, but if you wound up in the principal's office one too many times, you were required to submit to a mandatory counseling session to see if it was something in the home or school environment that was triggering the wrong set of instincts. And that meant telling them he was a Grimm.

So he kept his head down.

At nights, though, he would strap his sword across his back with the hilt hanging down by his hip, and he would stick his guns into their shoulder holsters. He would strap his throwing blades to his sleeve bracers, and his holdout pistol by one ankle with a hunting knife on the other one. And he would cover it all with the black leather coat that hung down to his knees, and he would walk around with his aunt Marie, and he knew that even though he wasn't a murderer, there was no way that anyone would ever mistake him for not being a Grimm if they could see him like this.

He didn't even know when he'd started wearing all black, like his parents. He didn't know when he'd taken to wearing so many weapons. All he knew was that when his aunt looked at him, she would smile with such pride in her eyes that it made him want to try even harder, to show her that he would be able to protect her if she ever needed it, that she wouldn't die the way his mom and dad had.

They would go and sit in outdoor restaurants and cafes, and his aunt would point out people and ask him what he thought of them. And bit by bit, he learned to use his senses.

He learned to look, to see the little things, the things that nobody else noticed or pieced together. To listen for the softest heartbeat or flutter of cloth, and smell the difference between a Luisant-Pecheur and an Eisbiber. To feel the change in the direction of the wind, and the change in direction of someone they were tailing who was three blocks ahead.

Some days, he felt like a spy. Or a secret agent.

Other days, he felt the weight of all the metal pressed against his skin, and how comfortable he was with it, and he wanted to crawl under the covers and never come out again.

x

When Nick was sixteen, his aunt taught him how to drive the truck. And she took him out with a sniper rifle and showed him how to use it for the first time.

If there was one thing he would pick, one thing he would select to describe his life, to explain the dichotomy of his life, it would be that.

Excitement at finally being allowed to drive, and excitement at being finally being allowed to use the M107 .50 caliber. Being the normal kid on one hand, and the Grimm in the other.

It took him a few days, but he finally worked up the courage to ask his aunt the question he'd always had about their kind.

Why did they kill?

She sat down with him and explained. She explained about how sometimes there were bad people out there that needed to be stopped. People who would hurt innocents unless they came to a final, permanent end.

Nick pointed out that he knew that. That was what the prison system was for, and the death sentence, and executions. But why couldn't they let the police handle that?

She explained that they had information that the police didn't. That kin secrets were generally kept within the family of that kin. Police didn't have that information. It was closely guarded, desperately clung to, treated with such solemn guard that many took it to their grave without ever speaking the words they had been told. But the Grimms knew those secrets. They passed them down to their children with each successive generation. The last time the police had tried to take down a Siegbarste, it had killed more than a dozen men. But Grimms knew their secrets, their strengths and their weaknesses, and all it took was one poisoned bullet to do the job.

Nick asked why they didn't just share the information, then, if it made such a big difference.

Because you never know who you can trust, Marie explained, patiently. You never knew who was corrupt and who was on the level. And in order to stay alive when you were a Grimm, you needed to presume everyone guilty until proven innocent. Who was to say that if they made the information widely available, it wouldn't start riots and massacres? Predators going into a panic at having their weaknesses and habits revealed, wholesale slaughter of prey whose dens were unearthed, opportunists taking every chance to try and suppress the information and take it for their own, being branded as terrorists for releasing what they knew. And when asked where they got the information from, what would they say? That their ancestors tortured it out of every man, woman, and child they could get their hands on?

Nick understood, but he still felt weird about it. Police existed because they were supposed to handle that job. If they weren't effective, then why were they still around?

Marie told him that it was because Grimms were so hated, they were killed off when they were revealed openly. So there weren't enough of them left in the world to police everyone themselves. The government still had to be seen to be doing something, though, so they constructed a makeshift quasi-military force to keep the illusion of peace and sanctuary.

Nick pointed out that the policeman had found him when he was little and taken care of him until Marie came for him. They weren't completely ineffectual.

She agreed, they weren't. But they weren't equipped to handle every situation. Not like Grimms were.

Nick asked the next question that had seemed logical to him.

Why weren't they police, then?

Aunt Marie had gotten really quiet. Nick had been forced to explain- if that Siegbarste had been facing a Grimm, it only would have taken one bullet to take him down, but instead he killed a dozen people. Why didn't they stop that sort of tragedy before it happened? Leave the cases that they were equipped to handle to the rest of them, and face the ones they weren't?

They would have first access to the scene of a crime, so instead of having to sneak around trying to get information on a murder or a robbery, they would be able to walk straight up to the cordon tape and be let through. And they would be allowed to hunt the bad ones without getting in trouble for it- if it was their job to hunt the bad ones, they would even get paid to do it. They would get forewarning about terrorists entering the country, and if there was a mystery they wanted to solve then they would have a reason to be able to gather all the information without risking getting in trouble for it.

Marie told him, softly, that if they found out that he was a Grimm, they would shoot first and never bother to ask questions.

He pointed out that the only way anyone found out what race anyone was anymore was a Woge under stressful circumstances. That was how he handled school. Act calm and even-tempered and reasonable, and even when things were at their most tense, everyone just presumed that he was keeping a clear head, even when nobody else was.

She warned him again. A time would come that his powers would blossom, when he would be more than just a boy with some skills and a few weapons. A time would come that people would cower away from meeting his eyes, when his aura of terror would be so great that he couldn't control it, and everyone around him that he cared for would flee rather than set foot in the same building as him. A time would come when he would Woge, too- when the Grimm inside of him grew strong enough that it could come out- and gazing upon it would make those who saw it beg for their lives.

He pointed out that she could control it, couldn't she? She could look people in the eye- she did it all the time. So obviously it was possible to put a leash on it. If he could control himself, if he could keep ahold of himself, there wouldn't be any problems.

She warned him that it would mean endangering himself to an inexcusable extent. That one slip up, one tiny mistake, and it would mean his head. He asked if she was telling him that as his aunt or his mentor.

Marie warned him that as his aunt, she wanted to keep him safe. As his mentor, she wanted to make him dangerous. As both, she would have settled for him not being stupid.

He had never felt more Grimm than in the moment when he met her gaze and asked her when the last time she'd mistaken him for being something as boring as stupid.

It finally got her off his back. And although the times when he hinted that he had his own agenda and already had plans for how to achieve it left his aunt watching him cautiously, it seemed to make her happy. As though she had been worried that he didn't have that ruthlessly conniving streak in him, just like she had worried about since he was little.

He did have a plan behind becoming a policeman. He just wasn't certain she would approve of it.

It was, after all, because of something Raleigh had said when they were little.

Even if you wind up evil later, that doesn't mean you can't do good right now.

He had all the skills. All the talent. He wanted to put them to good use.

He just... didn't agree with his aunt on one very simple thing.

He didn't think that being a Grimm counted as good use.

As a policeman, though- he could stop the bad guys. He could stop them with all of his knowledge, and he could do it without having to resort to turning into some kind of serial killer. He'd looked into it- he knew enough to know that there was a method- that the cops only killed someone when they had to. And with backup, they rarely had to. Not like it would be for him if he followed the life stretching ahead of him.

He had never killed anyone. And if he had to, he wanted to make sure that it was because it was necessary, not just because he wanted to. And his aunt really wasn't very good on that front- in her mind, every kill was a correct one.

He would hide every aspect of himself if he had to. Never tell anyone about his childhood or his home life or his instincts or what race he was. He just wanted to have that moral justification- he wanted to immerse himself in the ethics that he had never been taught by his family. He wanted to have guidelines and parameters to work around. Not just rules that were meant to be broken, but laws. Laws that defined right and wrong, that he could follow to the letter and be able to hold onto the thought that he wasn't evil.

That would be the yardstick he could measure himself by. When the day came that he broke those laws without a thought, he would finally know that he had become a full and complete Grimm in every aspect of the word. That he was finally evil.

Until that day came, he would be a good person. He would do good, if only to try and make up for the suffering he would inevitably one day cause. And when he started to do evil, instead- maybe, just maybe, by having all the police around, someone would notice. And catch him before he did anything unforgivable.

His aunt, though- she didn't know. And if he had told her that was his plan, she would have interfered so badly he wouldn't possibly be able to do as he liked.

x

When Nick was seventeen, he went to the guidance councilor's office for the first time. Willingly.

He sat down with her and asked what path to take if he wanted to work in the police force. And she had been delighted to tell him.

When they got to the issue of his race, she asked if he was comfortable telling her. And when he said no, she eased off of him and reassured him that many weren't, and not to worry about it. Thanks to the laws that had been passed ten years before, nobody was allowed to mandate that a potential employee reveal their race, thanks to a great deal of groundbreaking anti-discrimination policies.

"But all the same, I feel the need to warn you, there are unique challenges for both predator and prey types in law enforcement." she continued, patiently. "May I at least ask which case you belong to?"

He had been silent for a long moment. Eying her, looking over her muzzle of dark fur and her long, sharp fangs. And then, he had told her he was a predator.

When she pushed a little further- was he talking about a mid-to-low level predator, or one of the higher ones? He was feeling even more uncomfortable by the minute. When he'd nearly stood up to walk out, she apologized, and reassured him that it was personal. Between them, none of the other staff needed to know. And if he didn't want to say, then that was perfectly fine.

He finally bit out that he was a rare type of apex predator. And she had taken it in stride, and that was that, and she started pulling up pamphlets for him.

She remarked that the primary difficulty that apex predators faced in law enforcement was one of self control. A takedown had all the same thrills as the hunt, the chase, and- if he let himself get carried away- he might take it as far as the kill. There was some issue in interrogations, as well, of dealing with rowdy or unruly suspects and prisoners, of keeping his temper in check. Any high stress environment could lead to Woging, and the unfortunately bad-timed Woge of an apex predator could set off fireworks, even leading to cases of suspects attempting to sue for being 'mistreated' or 'threatened'.

Nick informed her, simply, that he had control of steel over his instincts. And when she had glanced up at him with an eyebrow raised, he brushed it off by mentioning that among the student body, he was known for being the most patient and even-tempered, more even than many of the teachers. It was important to him not to scare others or chase them away, so he had always been concerned about controlling his Woge, even from a very young age. It was simply out of the question for him to lose control.

She had stood, and a split second later there had been a Hundjager snarling in his face.

Nick didn't even blink as a trail of spit just barely missed his cheek, even as his mind noted all the things in the room he could use to dispatch her if it looked like she was going to do more than attempt to frighten him.

The councillor had returned to her seat, straightening her hair and brushing the ruffles out of her clothes, watching him with an eyebrow raised. She admitted herself impressed, and mentioned that it had taken her until she was twice his age to have even half that amount of self control.

As always, he was disgusted with himself. Disgusted with the fact that he had been considering how to kill her, disgusted that it had even been an option in his internal dialogue.

All the more important he did all the good he could, while it was still an option. There was no telling when the Grimm within him would finally grow enough to awaken, and then he really would be dealing with the horrible instincts that she was talking about.

Nick may have hated that part of himself, but there was one thing he didn't mind. And that was the manipulative streak he had been born with.

He praised her on her own self control and admitted it may have been an unfair test, since he hadn't felt like she would actually snap at any point, even during the snarl. Acknowledging that instead of being able to use his Woge like that, to keep a handle on it even transformed, he just suppressed it deep enough that it never became problematic. She had nodded sadly and admitted that it was a surprisingly common method that plenty of young predators used to try and put a leash on their inner beast.

She told him the best method for becoming accepted as a cop. It would be hard- there were rigorous tests and background checks involved- but he assured her he had never been arrested and there was nothing in his school transcripts that would cause a problem. He would have to be able to fulfill the Physical Abilities Test, and depending on where he decided to settle down, there may be a high level of competition for the opening. There were a few things that could get him a leg up over the competition- honorable discharge from military service was one of those things. A degree in Criminal Justice or Psychology was another. All three would be the closest thing to an easy in he was looking at. There were other things they would be looking for- a valid driver's license, proficiency with firearms, control over his Woge- which he had already proved, in her opinion. And the whole time, they would be watching him with a careful eye to make sure he could keep any negative opinions he might have had about people of different races, sexual orientations, and religions to himself.

When he'd mentioned that their family didn't have much money, she had laughed it off and told him that with his grades, scholarships wouldn't be a problem. And when he admitted that he loved art, and showed her a few of his sketches- of plants and buildings and landscapes, never people, lest someone realize he couldn't see anything but their beasts facing him- she had been delighted, and mentioned that his passion would likely be able to get him a nice package for a good school.

Nick thanked her at the end of the hour. And as he was packing up to leave, she pushed a few resource pamphlets about Taming the Beast Within and You and Your Inner Instincts into the folder along with everything else, and he smiled. He knew she would push them on him, so long as he pulled the right strings.

His first and last trip to the Guidance Councillor hadn't been so bad after all.


	4. Learning to Love and Lose with Grace

When he was eighteen, his aunt had held him close and told him that when she held him in her arms the day he was born, she had looked into his eyes and seen a patient power, there. A silent strength that she hadn't been able to touch.

Now, looking at him like this- all grown up- that power was evident in the way he spoke, and walked, and how he held himself. He was graceful, and polite, and dangerous, and she loved him. He was her nephew, and she knew that she never said it, and she knew that she pushed him too hard. But she loved him.

She had taken him out on the town, armed to the teeth and wearing his favorite coat, and when his back was turned, she had vanished.

When he returned home, the truck and the trailer were gone, and a few trunks of his only possessions had been left behind. A letter had been tucked into the top one.

_I love you so much._

_You have your own life ahead of you. Your own life to live. Your own dreams and goals._

_You've done so well. You've made me so proud. If your parents could only see you now._

_You don't need me anymore. You haven't in a long time._

_It may be hard, but you're a survivor. And I've been ignoring my calling for far too long._

_Do what you need to do. Be who you need to be._

_You won't hear from me again. Not until your Becoming. Not until your instincts begin to awaken._

_You deserve a chance to enjoy your life while you can._

_But when the Grimm within you opens its eyes, I'll be there at your side. Until then, stand strong._

_My beloved nephew. My student. My flesh and blood. As good as my own son._

_Never, ever doubt that you are the thing which matters most to me in the world._

She had signed it at the bottom. _Marie Kessler._

She'd left him money.

He didn't know where it had come from. They had never been rich. But there was more than enough to keep him for a while if he was frugal with it.

The next day in school, when one of his friends at lunch- one of the few who bothered to remember a bit more about him than the usual fare- asked him how his eighteenth birthday had gone, he quietly stated that his aunt had made it fairly clear that he needed to get his own place. And he asked if any of them were in the market for a roommate.

It had taken him a few days, but finally, there was a Lowen who mentioned that he needed to get out from under his parents oppressive thumb, and someone had mentioned Nick to him, and they had gotten together and talked about jobs and school and how much space they would need. Worst habits and best traits.

For Nick, he'd noted that he had an obsessive need for privacy, and wouldn't appreciate it if his personal things were disturbed. James had enjoyed that, and said that it would set his mind at ease to have those kinds of boundaries, too.

For James, he cited that he was perfectly willing to do chores, but that unless they actively set up a schedule, he would never take the incentive to do them unless Nick complained about it first. Nick admitted that he was used to a two person household, and had been since he was twelve, so he was used to dividing up jobs around the house.

That had gotten James talking about his own family, and how excited he was to finally get away from them. They sounded horrid, well past the line of emotionally abusive. Nick had reasoned that the more work they got done sooner than later, the faster they would be able to get James out of his place, and the sooner he would be able to have an actual place to stay. So they'd kept talking it over as school got let let out. And then James had let out a fierce growl that had nothing to do with being a Lowen and everything to do with his stomach, and Nick had mentioned dinner, and soon they were discussing it all over a carnivore's delight pizza as they sprawled out in the park.

Nick knew that preferred food was as much a giveaway as anything else was when it came to your race. He knew James was a Lowen, but James didn't know he knew that. However, Nick hadn't hesitated to order the pizza, which indicated to James that he was predator as well, and the fact that James hadn't batted an eyelash was supposed to be a good indicator toward what he was.

The whole interaction had always been interesting to him. The nuances of pretending to be something he wasn't. Knowing how to play the game, even though he had no place in it.

So he and James talked until the Lowen's curfew. And when they saw eachother the next morning, they talked more. And more.

It took a week for them to decide on an apartment. Not too expensive, well within their combined price range, and Nick offered up some of the money that had been left to him as a deposit.

It didn't take them long to move in.

True to his word, Nick kept his more personal things under tight watch. His weapons and the letter, kept in a truck by the side of his bed, locked, the only key hanging around his neck. James took the possessiveness in stride and seemed to appreciate that Nick would only ever touch his things if he left them laying out somewhere that they were in the way, and then only to place them somewhere that James could deal with them later.

True to his word, James put a big white board up in their small kitchen, a weekly calendar for who got what chores. They worked on a rotation of every other day, and before long they had a comfortable routine.

It was a few months before James fell asleep in his lap.

It was one awkward day after that when Nick experienced his first kiss.

It was a few tangled and confusing hours later that he lay on the rug with a purring Lowen curled against his side, running a hand through the other boy's mane to untangle it.

They started to talk a little more. James knew how to not push. He just talked about what it was like back at his home, what it was like to live in a family where his dad screwed any girl who stood still long enough, how many brothers and sisters he had, how he had reached the age where they had finally started pressuring him, testing the waters to see if he wanted to be a part of the Great Games. The more he had put on the thick act, pretending not to know what it was they wanted from him, the more frustrated and irritable his extended family had gotten, until he knew he had to get out of there before they forced him into something he would regret.

Slowly, over the course of weeks, Nick began talking as well. How he had lived on his own with his aunt since he was twelve, and she had put a lot of pressure on him as well. Pressure to perform well, to make her proud, to be powerful. He'd trained in his family's- traditional ways- to try and make her happy, even though he didn't really want to, even though they really grated on his nerves most of the time. And then he'd turned eighteen, and she had just- ditched him. It wasn't like he didn't know she loved him, it was just- she had her own things to do. Her own life to live. He had been holding her down, and when she got the opportunity, she just left. She made sure he had ambition, made sure he could take care of herself, and then left him to sink or swim.

It hurt. He didn't mind it, as such, because he understood. He could see where she was coming from. But all the same, he still missed her, and it grated.

James held him tight and nuzzled against his cheek and told him it was alright to miss her, because maybe he wasn't sad for her- especially if she was free to do what she liked. Maybe he was just sad for him, for not being able to see her anymore.

He wouldn't have called them boyfriends. James made no move to ever mark him, and the sex was always immensely gentle. It wasn't passion that drove them together, more like a pair of lifetimes of being deprived of tender touches, lacking hugs and kisses, of never knowing what it felt like to cuddle and trust and soothe.

Nick hadn't known how much he needed it until he found himself looking at the whole thing as though from the outside, judging what good the relationship had done for both of them. Until one day, curled up on the couch together eating popcorn and watching an action movie, he realized that even the 'him' of a single year ago would never have been able to consider trusting anyone like this.

He hadn't even realized how cold he'd become until James had broken through his shields and given him a reason not to be.

It was that kindness which finally made up his mind for him. He'd been debating whether to enter college straight out of high school, or whether to go through military service first, to give him that edge that the guidance councilor had mentioned. Service wouldn't be that hard for him, he had thought- he'd been raised to be a hunter since he was little, and it would get him closer to his goal.

But holding James and listening to the low rumble of his chest as he purred, Nick knew he'd made up his mind. The whole point of this was to do good while he still had the chance, and it didn't take much to realize that he would do more good with a pen in his hand than a gun.

x

When Nick was nineteen, he entered college. Criminology, Law, Sociology, and Art.

Including his part time job, it left him very little free time to relax.

What little time he had, he spent with James, who was similarly busy. He was determined to be a biochemistry major, and Nick didn't envy him when he glanced over to see the Lowen staring blankly at a page of calculations that made his head spin.

But still, laying together and doing their research, laying with their bodies pressed against eachother so they could feel one-another's warmth at their side, it made it easier to get through with the comfort of solidarity.

x

When Nick was twenty, and James was twenty-one, the Lowen bought them beer for the first time. Neither one had ever had it before, and it had taken Nick about twice as much to get drunk as it had James. But sooner or later, they were laying back and just talking, and Nick felt the pleasantly floaty feeling tugging at him from behind his eyes, and when the conversation came around to what they both thought their families were doing right now, Nick had blurted out- without barely thinking about it- that his aunt was probably burying a body.

James had always known what Nick meant by being raised old traditional. There was really only one thing that could mean, for a predator, and that was being raised to hunt and kill. But he'd never said it outright before.

James had hugged him, and stated that his mom was probably cheering his dad on in the ring as he fought. Likely to the death. He said that if he ever had kids, he would never raise them that way, with that sort of tension hanging over their head.

Nick closed his eyes and mumbled that he didn't want to have kids.

Maybe he would someday, but he was just getting used to not hating himself and resenting his bloodline. He wasn't sure he would want to burden anyone else with the genetics that he'd been saddled with.

James had offhandedly mentioned that he still didn't know what Nick was. That even when they came together, and James went full Woge, Nick still managed to keep ahold of himself.

Nick had been silent for a long time. Until James had rolled over so he could look at him, and apologized for asking if it was a sore subject. Nick knew not to say a word close to the truth, but the alcohol was messing with his system, and he didn't want James to think it was because Nick didn't enjoy it when they were together, so he blurted out that he was one of the rare 'late bloomer' types who didn't develop their Woge until they got older. James's eyes had gone wide, and this time, Nick actually knew why. Even the most common of the ones who had a delayed Becoming- delayed past puberty, past twenty years, even- were the ones who were powerful enough to actually be considered a threat to the Royals. Immensely powerful, tough to kill, borderline immortal beings who always caused a stir when they picked sides or moved to a new place. Unfortunately, because of how much more powerful the beast was, the instincts were that much worse, and when the child had grown up without them- well, there were more than enough cases of the Becoming winding up stripping their minds raw and leaving them completely driven by borderline alien motivations.

The older you were when you had your Becoming, the worse it would inevitably be, until the most powerful ones out there- those who were more like forces of nature or Gods than human beings- seemed to be insane down to the last man.

James had asked if he knew when he would develop it. Nick had honestly told him that he had no idea, but that before his aunt left, she had implied he had time to 'live for himself' before it would overtake him. He wasn't looking forward to his instincts, but if he had to, he would lock himself in a cell until he could figure out how to handle them. And if he couldn't, then at least being in the police meant that someone had to figure out what was wrong with him- even if he tried to hide it - and make the judgement call as to whether or not he was still functional enough to be allowed on active duty. Much less to be a part of normal society.

James had pushed his beer aside and tentatively reached out to let Nick curl up against him. He admitted that when Nick tried to tell him that living with his aunt had meant a lot of pressure, he hadn't realized exactly how much until just now.

Nick had told him, right then and there, that he hadn't realized how grateful he was for the relationship between him and James until he looked back and saw how much more stable he was for having had it. How much he had needed to have this kind of connection to someone, after years of only being around his aunt, to remind him that it was alright to be happy to be alive and to be human. He didn't have any illusions that they wouldn't someday part ways, but for as long as it lasted, he would revel in it, and when it was over, he would still treasure the memories of their time together.

James had laughed, and nuzzled up against him, and Nick had tolerated a soft tongue licking the corner of his cheek. Affectionate licks turned to kisses, and soon after, they managed to drag themselves to the bedroom.

James had woken up with a hangover. Nick had known he'd said too much- burdened this lighthearted relationship too much with his darkness- but when James had looked up at him and pouted and whined about the light and the sound and his head and how everything was trying to kill him, Nick hadn't been able to stop smiling all morning.

x

When Nick was twenty one, he realized how much he had let himself go when he couldn't pick up the trunk in his room to move it when he was cleaning.

When he was a teenager, and the only things he'd had to do were study and train, he'd been able to wear every single weapon in that trunk on his body like they were extensions of himself. As though they had weighed nothing at all.

Two years of being so busy, between school and work and James, had led to him losing a lot of his muscle tone.

So he started working out again.

His Law class wound up requiring him to intern in a firm to get some practical experience, and he got paid better for that than his other job, so he cut back his hours a bit. Managed to schedule in some time every day for him to hit the gym.

James definitely noticed the improvement. Nick found himself getting licked a lot more often as the Lowen explored his abs, his biceps, the small of his back...

Nick knew that when he passed people in the street, they could smell so much of the Lowen on him that they probably presumed he was one. Which, honestly, he could deal with. People didn't tend to ask if they thought they already knew the answer.

When Nick could lift the trunk again- easily- he pulled out the letter for the first time in years and read it again, late at night when James was asleep. He read it and wondered how long he had before he saw his aunt again. Before his life became not his own.

Before he looked in James's eyes and saw fear there, instead of tenderness.

x

When Nick was twenty two, he got his undergrad degree.

He and James both had sort of come to an understanding about the extent of this relationship. James hadn't been shy about admitting that he wanted to travel overseas, to maybe try putting his new skills to work in Geneva or Rome. And Nick knew that when that day came, they would part ways.

Nick had stood with him in the airport and kissed him goodbye. One last kiss, and a murmured wish of good luck, and then- that was it.

When he returned back to the apartment, it was only him living there, now.

He was making enough on his own that he didn't need a roommate anymore, but the silence- the stillness- was lonely.

There were too many memories there between them. Too much they had shared.

Nick packed up what little he owned- which was barely more than he'd had when Marie left him- and hit the road with his diploma and his new sedan.

Moving around like before. Like when he'd lived in the silver bullet trailer, like when he'd had a home that moved along with the whim of the wind.

He never checked maps. Just let the urge to move take him, letting his heart tell him where he wanted to be. Making money along the way by doing odd jobs on the side.

It didn't take him long to recognize that he wasn't such a fan of hot weather. He loved his coat, he preferred layers- they had a sort of protective comfort to them, he could hide things in them, he could hide himself behind them- and that led him to colder climates.

And one night, standing on the top of a hill, feeling the rain patter against his face, he felt at peace.

He asked a passing cab driver where he was, and got directions to a hotel. He stayed the night, and when he woke up, the crisp smell of fresh dew greeted him.

Nick had landed in Portland, Oregon.

It didn't take him that long to find a new home. There was a little place over a bakery, the owners had three floors above the business and they were only using one of them, happy to rent out the other two. It didn't cost too much, and there was a balcony overlooking the street, and every morning he awoke to the smell of the day's first batch of pastries turning golden in the oven.

The bakers- Mr. and Mrs. Garrett- were warm and welcoming, a couple that weren't even fifteen years older than him, but they had the old souls that rang of comfort and patience, pies on windowsills and hand knit sweaters, and they treated him like a favorite grandson who'd finally come to visit. When he dashed down in the mornings to grab a cup of coffee, they always let him into the bakery early so they could stuff him with danishes and croissants before he had to head off to sign up for police recruitment.

When his transcripts came through, the proctors slipped him into a testing position that someone had dropped at the last moment. He did so well on the written test that he was in the top ten percent, and when he did the physical exam, he was relieved to discover that he was a good deal more honed than most of the other applicants, and the only one who kept his composure through every level of the Woge suppression challenge- though he felt his heart twinge in his chest, knowing he was technically cheating- but it was more like an extended bout of baiting than anything else, and by the end any sympathy he might have had for it was gone. By the time the oral interview came around, he was feeling pretty good about the whole thing.

All it took was for him to admit to a fraction of the desire he had to do good in the world, to hold himself to a high standard and try to keep the peaceful lives of the innocent undisturbed by those who would take advantage of them, and practically the next thing he knew, he was walking up the steps of the precinct to get his first look at the place he would be working at, with any luck.

For sixteen weeks, he studied at the Basic Academy. Without James there, it was back to that old grind- study and train. He wasn't afraid to show off his acute observational skills, nor his mind for profiling. His teachers noticed, even if the other potentials didn't.

He made it out with excellent marks. And started his eighteen month probationary period at the station.

It took six of those months for someone to remember his name for the first time.


	5. Making Fated Connections

When he was twenty three, he began going on patrols for the first time. After his eighteen months were up, he had been given a badge and a gun. His dream finally come true.

The Advanced Academy- he'd gone for it as soon as he could, just to get it out of the way- was nowhere near as difficult as he had expected it to be. Takedown tactics and negotiating with twitchy crooks was nothing compared to the sort of lessons his aunt had drilled into his head.

He learned fast to relax when he got the chance. He was on call 24/7, which meant that sometimes sleep was something that needed to be gotten out of the way in the middle of the afternoon.

Sometimes, in his touchier and more sleep deprived moments, he found himself almost looking forward to his Becoming. He remembered how Marie had seemed to be able to recharge after four hours of sleep, instead of eight, and as he was grabbing coffee- if he was lucky, from the bakery, but if he was unlucky, from the station- he found himself musing on how much more he could get done, how much more on task he would be if he could get away with that little rest.

And speaking of his nature as a Grimm, there was one very special, very interesting person at the station.

It was the Chief.

Nick wasn't quite sure what it was about him. Some days, he could look the man in the eye without a second thought and identify him as a Zauberbiest. But then sometimes, out of the corner of his eye, when the chief was focused on something and not making a concerted effort to focus himself on seeming normal...

His face would change. Shift.

For just a second, it would look like Nick's face. Like his aunt's. Like his parents.

Soft, tan flesh, without scales or fur except on the very top of his head. Sleek, groomed hair, and deep, piercing eyes. Like the pictures that people drew for books. The pictures of what faces were supposed to look like without a Woge.

And just sometimes, out of the corner of his eye, Nick saw something else. Like a flash of silver and blue and violet where the Captain should have been, gone the moment he actually focused on it.

Nick didn't know what it meant. Sometimes he reasoned that as a powerful Zauberbiest, perhaps he was using some kind of illusion to keep himself looking normal, so that even if he Woged in public, nobody would know- something powerful enough to mess with even Nick's eyes. Sometimes he wondered if Captain Renard was something else entirely, and he was going to great lengths to try and disguise himself. Sometimes, Nick even considered that maybe the man was Grimm himself. After all, the only people he'd ever seen with faces like that were his own family.

But whatever the Captain's deal was, it didn't make him any less effective as the head of their precinct. He handled politics like he was born for it, he treated his subordinates with the respect they were due, and when he needed to, he had a sense of humor- albeit one that tended towards playing the straight man to any shenanigans that bored, off-duty policemen got up to after a stressful case. So whatever he was- curious as Nick was- he thought too much of the man to pry. And he would never have confronted him about it- one the one hand, how could he without revealing what he himself was? On the other hand, Nick was no stranger himself to hiding his identity behind a construct of something else, and if someone had walked up to him tomorrow and torn all of that down with the five dreaded words-_ I know what you are_- he might have had a heart attack in the street.

He certainly didn't want to do that to the Captain. So instead, he focused on his job, and when he saw the flickers of something other, he kept them to himself.

And maybe, just maybe, if he found himself sympathizing when the chief looked particularly drained, he would spare a quick glance to make sure there was nothing truly _wrong_ before going back to his work.

So he went on being a cop.

It wasn't exactly what he had expected. When you wore the shield, more often than not your job consisted of patrolling, guarding, putting in face time- you were one of the bricks which made up the wall which protected the lawful citizens from the dangerous criminal element. That said, you weren't the one hunting them down, doing the busts and solving the mysteries. But he couldn't count the number of times that his day had consisted of doing fruitless research while chained to his desk- or being relegated to some painfully unhelpful task like answering hotline phones to listen to paranoid people complain about how their goldfish had been replaced by an imposter and how the end was nigh, he just had to look at the signs!

It hadn't taken him long to realize that being a policeman wasn't all it was cracked up to be.

The people around him weren't as observant as he had wanted them to be. Barely any of them so much as noticed him, much less that there might be something different about him. He had wanted it to be easy to hide his past, his race, his lack of Woge- but not this easy. Nobody knew anything about him at all, and it didn't seem like they ever would.

He didn't like to think about how long it took him to realize he was lonely.

x

When Nick was twenty four, he met Calyssa.

She was the new girl that the bakery had hired on. She was a Konigschlange, and one of the first ones he had ever seen. Most mornings, he found his eyes trailing over to her, studying the patterns of her scales, the swirls on her hood, the stripes across her wrists. She really was fascinating.

And when she caught his eyes a few times, he always awkwardly looked away, embarrassed to have been caught staring.

One late night, as the shop was cleaning up, she walked over and told him they would be closing up soon, but Mrs. Garrett called from the back room that he was their tennant, and welcome to stay until the door was locked.

Calyssa had laughed, and said- "Oh, is that why you're always in here?" and he had quirked a smile.

"The coffee's good, the food's delicious, and it's the sort of place that makes you really feel at home." he mentioned. "I'm a lucky guy."

After that first interaction, she took up a habit of talking to him. She learned he was a cop, he learned she had just gotten back from a stint as a publisher, she told him that this would be the first year she was spending away from home, he admitted to his little 'where the wind takes you' tour that had led him to Oregon, he finally admitted that he still didn't really know many people here, and she had mentioned that she was in the same boat. He was the first person she'd really just sat down and talked to.

He was busy, but she was understanding. More often than not, he was exhausted at the end of work, but he made an effort to come down and buy a scone and ask her how her day had been.

Despite his first impression of her, it didn't take long for him to discover that she was very passionate about things like protecting the environment, and conserving wilds areas, and preserving their cousins the animals. She had left her publishing company after refusing to get them to print on paper that was at least in part recycled, and it had driven her to leave after working herself into such a huff that she knew if she stayed, she would wind up egging some windows.

She didn't want to be one of those kind of activists, she explained. The irrational ones who let their anger out on the people who were being forced to play by the rules, whereas it was the system that was really at fault.

Nick sat back and listened, marveling at how dedicated she could be to what she believed in. Even when it failed her, she just took a step back and tried again. He'd always wondered, in the back of his mind- what was a 'good person'? He was trying to be one, predisposition to the contrary, but over the years it had seemed to him that everyone had good things they related to and bad things they rationalized.

Calyssa, he decided, was a good person.

Because, more than anything else, she tried to make certain that her actions did no harm, even to those who may have hurt her. And she did everything within her power to make the lives of those who had never done anything wrong by her as much better as she could. And most of all, she did all of it without expecting anything in return.

She wasn't perfect. No one was. But she was actually making an effort, as opposed to all the bastards out there who seemed to be driving straight to hell and dragging everyone they could down with them.

Neither of them talked about their pasts very much. They kept it to the present, and their dreams for the future. On a rare off-moment of talking about Portland, and how the cold was something new and slightly baffling, he'd mentioned that he saw a heat-treatment spa downtown for the cold-blooded, and she'd gotten very quiet. Half taken aback, half impressed, she'd admitted that nobody ever guessed right on the first try that she was in the serpentine family, and he'd brushed it off by telling her that he had noticed her habit of scenting the baked goods to see if they were done by opening her mouth and licking her lips, rather than sniffing them.

She tried the spa out on one of her days off. The next time he saw her, she was relaxed and smiling blissfully, and he laughed at the slightly euphoric look on her face.

She was the one who made the first move. In thanks for telling her about the spa, she asked if he would like to try out a new restaurant she'd seen across the street from her apartment. With her.

When he met her there, she was wearing a backless black dress, and he had never felt more glad that he'd thought to get a suit.

They ate, and his light sarcasm made her laugh, and they wound up back at her place afterwards.

When he kissed her, his lips tingled with the brush of her venom, and the danger involved was kind of thrilling.

Everything about their relationship was dangerous and thrilling.

It was nothing like being with James. There was no cuddling, no spending long evenings curled up together. She was a passionate woman, and when they were together it was intense and incredible and while they were friends outside the bedroom, the second he was in her bed, he was at her mercy.

She had no qualms about scraping her nails across his skin, in digging in and making him beg, in driving him past the edge of what he could withstand until he was actually dizzy. And when she was done, her chest heaving with exertion and her eyes alight with wild delight, her hood fully arched, that was when she was at her most beautiful.

In the end, they didn't last out the year. It was the littlest thing- she was proud of her prowess in bed. And the fact that she hadn't been able to make him Woge even once, hadn't been able to make him lose control and be reduced to his baser instincts...

He would have told her, but their relationship had never really been based on trust. He knew as much about where she came from as she knew about him- which was nothing. With James, at least, he had slipped up that one drunk night and admitted to being a late bloomer. He couldn't imagine telling Calyssa.

So they stayed friends. They still talked, and offered eachother recommendations for places to eat or find books or have tea, still relied on eachother to lend an ear after a particularly long day. But that was all they were. Friends.

He didn't have to wonder whether she resented not knowing what he was, though. The answer was in her eyes every time she looked at him.

x

When Nick was twenty five, he went to his first office party.

He'd never thought about it before, really- attending a big junction like that with all his workmates relaxing and having a good time. He didn't really know anyone else, after all.

But with Calyssa as the only other person he ever spent time with, after enough nights of trying to avoid her pointed stares, he had finally used the first excuse that came up to avoid having to see her. Which consisted of the first thing off the top of his head, which was preparing for an office party.

Within minutes of attending, he realized it was an ill-advised idea. He didn't want to get drunk, and potentially let something slip, but he wasn't particularly good at socializing without a few cocktails in his system.

He wound up standing in the corner, sipping a beer and wondering when it would be acceptable for him to flee the party without it coming across as bad manners, when he finally saw someone struggling with the cork of a bottle of champagne, complaining that it was stuck.

There was one trick he had learned back in college that had always delighted James to no end, something that combined his skill with blades with an amusing little parlor trick.

He walked up and told them to let him try. And when he was holding the bottle in one hand, he reached for one of the cake serving knives on the table.

All it took was a moment's fumbling to find the glass seam of the bottle, and then one clean swipe with the backside of the blade, and the cork- as well as the top ring of glass on the bottle- went flying.

It took him a second to realize that the whole party had gone silent.

And that practically everyone was staring at him.

He apologized and asked if they had been intending to save the bottle.

Before he could withdraw, he was practically mobbed. A few partygoers knew what he'd done, but none of them had ever actually seen it before- and the rest were all just curious, their eyes lit up with wonder.

Nick told them what it was called- _Le Sabrage_- and that it wasn't all that hard, it just took a little practice, and it was far more impressive when you used a full length sword to do it instead of a little cake knife.

Suddenly, people were talking to him.

They hadn't paid attention to him before, he found himself realizing, because he had never done anything worth remembering. He didn't talk much, he worked hard, he followed orders. There had been nothing remarkable about that.

All of a sudden, he was that one guy with the cool knife trick.

The guy who had been trying to open the bottle in the first place had slapped his back and poured him the first glass and drawn him into conversation.

They didn't hit many topics that he knew much about. Lots of talk about things that it seemed like nobody really knew much about, but liked to pretend that they did. When someone got around to asking him if he knew any other knife tricks, though, he admitted that he could throw with fairly decent accuracy, and that when he was little he'd learned to do some Balisong tricks, although he wouldn't be able to demonstrate because they were illegal in Oregon. That led into the question of where he'd been living when he learned them, which led to him explaining about his childhood spent traveling across the states with his aunt, and all of a sudden he was talking.

When he went home that night, it had been with a pleasantly confused sort of smile on his lips.

The smile only grew when he was greeted by name when he came into work the next morning.


	6. The Countdown

When Nick was twenty six, he met Hank.

Hank had been newly promoted to detective, and Nick had been told to follow his lead. Hank was swamped with work, trying to get through a divorce as well as two cases and writing up the details of a third case to hand off to the FBI.

Nick had felt so bad for him- overworked to the point of exhaustion- that he ploughed through and wrote up the case for the feds himself, pushing Hank to fill out the divorce forms so he could get it out of the way.

More nights than not, Nick wound up hauling Hank out of bars where he was drowning himself to try and forget the amount of shit on his plate. Half the time, Hank spent his off-time hiding and crying, and Nick was forced to track him down and haul him back to his desk.

Once, Hank had called him in the middle of the night, drunk as hell and begging for Nick to forgive him for being so stupid.

Something in his voice had Nick tugging on his coat and driving straight to the detective's listed address, talking to him the whole time to make sure he was still on the line.

He was glad he did. When he got there, Hank had a gun in his hand and a shaky letter written out in front of him, and Nick had promptly confiscated it. And then hauled the sobbing man to the couch, where he fell asleep.

He'd stuck around. Stayed awake the whole night, watching over Hank to make sure he didn't get any more stupid ideas in his head.

When Hank woke up the next morning, Nick hadn't had an hour of sleep. But all the same, he took Hank out to breakfast, and listened to him talk about how he'd really thought this lady was going to be the one, his mate, the one he would spend the rest of his life with.

Nick sat with the distressed Skalenzahne until he calmed down. That night, he stayed at Hank's place again, this time passing out on the couch as Hank huddled in bed. He stayed just so Hank wouldn't consider the possibility of his gun again.

Slowly, things got better. They were never as bad as that first night. Nick finished the write-up for him and gave him credit for it, even as Hank signed off on the last of the divorce papers. With those out of his way, it left enough time for him to investigate the two cases, with Nick dutifully offering every bit of help he could.

He solved both of them. One, a hit and run, the other a robbery. Turned out, in the end, that it was the same case. The getaway driver had sped through a red light and mowed down a group of tourists, one of whom never made it to the hospital.

Case by case, Hank got better. Bit by bit, he started to recover, until Nick actually trusted him enough to leave him alone for long stretches of time. When things got bad, though, Nick would still invite himself over and plant himself in Hank's kitchen, insistently forcing him to think about something else- like whatever game was on, or where they should get takeout, or whether or not Hank was going to attend such-and-such an event.

Hank never thanked him for it. Not outright.

But his eyes practically shone with exasperated relief every time he opened the door to find Nick standing there with a pack of cold beer and some ancient cult classic film they could both secretly fall in love with.

Nick wouldn't have called the man his best friend. Not exactly. That implied a certain amount of trust and communication that they didn't really have.

All the same. Of all the people Nick had ever been glad had noticed him, Hank was definitely at the top of that list.

x

When Nick was twenty seven, and he had been working with Hank for a year now, he knew what he wanted.

He'd seen Hank's job, he'd seen the life of the police detective, and he knew that was closer to what he'd always dreamed of than what he had now. His job right now was full of paperwork and cleaning, standing around on hand to offer assistance to the people who were really doing good in the world.

Hank did real investigating. He was at the front lines, he was in ground zero, he was the one who bore the brunt of the grieving and brought killers to justice. The job that Nick had thought he was getting into when he signed up to be a cop.

He knew he was coming up on five years of service. And that after four and a half years, you were allowed to take the promotion test to either become a Sergeant, a Criminalist, or a Detective.

He knew what he was going to do. He waited until he had the time under his belt, until he had proven his worth. Nick knew how to be patient, but all the same, every day he counted down until he could be reasonably certain they would give him a chance felt like it dragged on for an eternity.

x

When Nick was twenty eight, he sat for the test.

Hank was the only one of his workmates that he told. As he passed the Captain the application request, the man read through his reasons why he was best suited for the job and eyed him for a moment before scribbling a recommendation.

It seemed like there were endless evaluations and tests and people coming out of the woodwork to ask him uncomfortable questions. He proved his eye for detail over and over again in little ways, and one of his interrogators pushed him so hard that Nick finally pushed back and vocally profiled him from where he was born right down to what he'd had for lunch, the status of his love life and how he was drawn to one night stands with women who were already in long-term relationships, his estrangement from his siblings and how he needed to take his car in for a tune-up before it died on him. Nick didn't see that man again.

All on top of the work he already had to do. If he hadn't been getting enough sleep before, he might have classified as an insomniac now.

He showed how good he was with cryptograms ("I like solving puzzles. I always have."), how good he was at reading body language ("Once you get used to looking for certain behaviors, it just becomes second nature."), and how good he was at digging up information ("One part knowing where to go, one part knowing who to ask, and the other fifty parts are all knowing how to do both without making things worse.").

And when it was all finally, finally over, he stood in front of the Captain again. And for just a moment, he was staring back at Nick with that face- not the Zauberbiest, but the pale brown skin and the grey blue eyes- and he knew that Captain Renard was pleased with him.

People were patting Nick on the back for days. Cheering him on, lightly teasing him by calling him the Rookie Detective, but it was all with the encouraging notes of congratulating him on his success.

In the back of his mind, he found himself cringing at the thought of what would happen one day, when it came out what Nick was. He'd always known that the point of this was so they would stop him, someday- all these smiling faces surrounding him. So that when he lost it, they could take him down. But looking at their eyes, the uncomplicated joy of wishing him well, even those who were tinged with jealousy and good-natured ribbing... he couldn't hope but wish that day would never come. He didn't like to think of the blow it would be to them, to find out that he had been a Grimm all along. That the whole time, he had been the monster right under their noses.

Would they be angry? Confused? Would they want answers- and would he be in any kind of state to give them? Would they be disappointed, regretful that such a promising life had to be wasted on him?

He wished things could just stay as they were, right like this, forever.

x

And then, Nick was twenty nine.


	7. In the Eye of the Beholder

Firstly, thanks so much for all of the support for this story! Every review is one more reason to keep writing.

Hope you enjoy!

* * *

"Oh come on, you can't be serious."

"Completely." Nick shook his head, watching the Skalengeck creep down the street.

"But he's got the look!" Hank protested. "The hoodie, the bandanna- I bet you anything if we walked over there right now and searched him, he'd have a piece down the back of his pants!"

"No denying that." Nick's eyes narrowed. "But Hank, that's just the point. There's a difference between profiling and stereotyping. He's not a banger. Clothing is only a small part of it- yes, he chooses to wear those clothes, and you've got to take into account a consideration of what sort of man would want to purposefully go out looking like that. But just because he wears it doesn't mean he rolls. More likely than not, yeah, he's a junkie- I'd say probably hooked on _eclipse_. But he's only wearing that getup to try and convince people not to mess with him on the street."

"Damn it." Hank sighed. He pulled out his wallet, thumbing through it mournfully and pulling out a five. Nick glanced over at it with a small smile of amusement.

"Three for three. You want to keep going?" he prompted.

"One more." Hank muttered. "I'll get it this time."

Nick sat back, waiting for Hank to make his choice. Scanning the crowd, trying to pick out someone to profile.

Nick's partner called it his _magic trick_. Being able to pluck facts out of mid air about anyone who crossed paths with them. It was something that Hank wanted to learn how to do, too. Of course, Nick was happy to try and help as best he could, which was the purpose of the game. If Hank got one right, Nick would pay for their coffee. If he failed one, he had to pitch in.

It didn't seem fair some days, of course. Nick couldn't tell Hank that he'd been able to see that the Skalengeck wasn't in a gang because of how the beast inside of him acted. How his scales cracked and bled where he'd scratched at them- at his arms- at his face. Gaping sores, wounds to his soul, every barbed word that ever left a scar imprinted permanently onto him. Oh, how he'd cowered and cringed away from everyone else. This wasn't someone with the self-confidence of having a whole gang at their back, no- this was someone whose addiction had driven away their family, their friends, everyone who'd meant something to them. This was a lonely, desperate man who'd been a lonely, desperate boy, who'd found something to dull the pain- but it only made him even more alone, and driven him further into desperation.

That poor bastard probably hadn't had a significant relationship for years. He'd been crushed down under the boot heel of his drug of choice, one that clung to him like a cloud that tainted every interaction he had with the world around him. And for all he may have been able to hide it, may have been able to put on a strong face for the world to see, the beast within him cowered away from every look and every touch as though it was a stinging slap.

No. No, that wasn't someone in a gang. That was someone who needed a warm blanket and a safe place to stay the night before a scuffle in a back alley somewhere got the better of him and he was left behind to bleed out.

Nick took a deep breath. Steeled himself. _Don't get emotionally invested in random people walking down the street, Nick. You aren't doing yourself any favors._

Then, he turned back to Hank, forcing a cheeky smirk onto his lips. There was no need for his partner to see how deeply shaken he was from that particular subject choice.

"Come on." he pressed. "You can't tell me you haven't seen anyone interesting pass by yet. In the time you've been frowning at that fire hydrant, Kenny Keeler and his bodyguards walked right past you."

"What?" Hank's head snapped up, eyes wide. "Kenny Keeler? The guy who plays that mad doctor from 'Off the Rail'?"

"Yep." Nick smacked his lips to emphasize the p. "Walked right past your window on his way downtown."

"Why didn't you say anything, man?" Hank sounded distraught. "I would have at least snapped a pic!"

Nick opened his mouth to shoot back some retort, but it disintegrated on the tip of his tongue.

Just for a second- for a split second- it was like there was some kind of aura around Hank. The air around him wavered like a mirage.

"Nick?" Hank asked, but it wasn't his usual growl. That was it, that one word- everything just seemed to collapse around that one word.

Scales faded away. Warm, dark eyes stared at him from out of the frame of a face covered in warm, dark skin.

_What?_

The world was a carnival ride, spinning round and round as he tried to catch up.

Something inside of his chest clenched. It twisted- an almost viscerally, physically painful feeling as if there was an eel curled around his heart.

Nick closed his eyes. Pinched the bridge of his nose. Rubbed at his eyes.

Deep breaths. Take deep breaths.

"Nick?" there was that voice again. "Are you okay?"

"Head rush." he hoped that the wavering of his voice would be passed off as momentary dizziness, because right now, he was in no kind of state to try and talk his way out of them. "Sorry."

"Hey, no problem. It's fine, man- look, maybe you need to lie down?"

The prospect of it- of laying on his back, eyes closed, baring his vulnerable points to those sharp teeth was completely beyond reason.

"No." the word slipped from his lips- a little sharper than he'd intended for it to be. "I'll be fine."

What was he doing? This was Hank. It was just his partner, Hank.

Hank wasn't a danger to him. He wasn't a threat.

-what had he been thinking, again?

"Hey, man. Come on, get out, stretch out in the back seat and get flat. Forget about the profiling thing for today, I'll grab our coffees."

A rustle from far too close to him, and Nick realized what was happening.

The money. The money he'd already won- Hank was taking it back.

His hand snaked out and wrapped around Hank's wrist.

Money meant food and shelter and security. Taking that away was- it wasn't-

No, he tried to remind himself. No, that was the whole point of the game. The money had always been intended for coffee, Hank was just offering to walk in and buy it. He was being nice.

A hand landed on his shoulder. On his shoulder. So close to his neck.

"You don't look so good, man." That concerned voice spoke up. "I'm right here. I'm right here, Nick. Not going anywhere."

Nick swallowed. If he did it right now, he would still be able to get in a first strike, long before Hank would get a chance to realize what-

Hank.

This was Hank.

He took those three words and shoved them at the other thoughts. Warm nights on the couch with a cold beer. Jokes at the expense of bad tv shows. Bouncing case ideas off of eachother.

Hank was earnest, and forgiving, and always gave too much of himself. Hank was kind, and determined, and was just as capable of complete, bone-deep happiness as he was capable of utter, bone-deep despair.

Nick trusted him.

The churning finally, finally subsided. Forced back into a corner and padlocked there with that one thought- that gem of trust that shoved away the shadows.

Nick took a deep breath. His eyes finally forced open.

Hank was sitting there, watching him. All scales and fangs. No sign of the- skin- he'd seen for just the briefest of seconds.

The relief at overcoming those strange thoughts was almost immediately slammed aside by the freight train of horror at what had just happened.

Nick managed to pry his fingers away from Hank's wrist one stiff joint at a time.

"Better." he forced out. "I... it's passed."

"Jesus, I hope so." Hank sounded worried. "Scared the hell out of me, man. You sure it was just a head rush?"

"Yeah." Nick brushed it off. He offered a watery smile. "Sorry, Hank. I'm going to take you up on that advice- maybe lie down for a second, get my head on straight."

"You go on ahead- I'll be right back." Hank reassured him. "Cup of joe and something to eat. Bagel?"

"Sesame." Nick managed to get himself upright long enough to pop the lever to lean his seat back, at which point he collapsed back against it. "Thanks. Sorry again."

He listened faintly to his partner's reassurances and watched as Hank circled around the car, heading for their usual cafe lunch place. He watched until he couldn't see Hank anymore, and then closed his eyes, feeling the beat of his heart hammering away inside his chest.

For one raw, painful moment, he had seen the world the way other people saw it.

For one raw, painful moment, he had wanted to kill Hank.

No.

It couldn't be. It was too soon. This was too soon.

_Twenty nine_, a treacherous little voice inside of him reminded him. _That's older than your parents were when they got together._

But he'd only just gotten his life the way he wanted it to be. He'd only just really carved out a place for himself.

He finally had the job of his dreams. Had a good friend and terrific partner in Hank. He'd only just this year started looking at houses to get him out of that small, if comfortable, apartment above the bakery.

He'd only just begun to fit in.

This wasn't right. It was too soon. It had to be too soon. He still had some time yet. Maybe it really was just a dizzy spell- or maybe it was a one time thing. Hell, when he'd first started seeing the chief shifting between his faces, he'd thought that he was going insane then, too. Maybe this was just a new thing. Something for him to get used to, to get the hang of. It didn't mean his time had come. Not necessarily.

He hadn't slept well for the last few nights- it was no wonder he was on edge. Probably just something in his subconscious reacting to Hank's big old teeth. Hell, with how they caught the light when they were right up in his face, it was a wonder he didn't freak out about them more often.

When Hank came back, Nick sat up. Managed a smile, accepted the coffee, laughed it off as fatigue and stress and hunger. Played their game for a little while longer, categorizing and cataloguing those who walked past them.

And when they came back to work through the lobby, if one of the Wildermanner registered for just a second with short hair and straight teeth and a smooth face, that certainly had nothing to do with why Nick walked a little faster than usual.


	8. Losing Sleep

It was just a little headache.

Nick sat at his desk, trying to focus on the words in front of him. _Body found off interstate highway. Bolo issued for grey sedan. Pulled over just as it was going to cross the state border._

Medical report._ Contusions to neck and face. Tox screen showed traces of Rohypnol._

Nick closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose.

He'd drank too much last night. Must have been. It was only a couple of beers, but they did tend to blur together after the first two or three. Sure, he'd never gotten hangovers like this before, but he'd grown up. Gotten older. He wasn't a kid anymore, with a kid's metabolism that could handle the abuse.

Maybe this was what it meant, when people complained about their bodies not working as well as they got older.

He would finish up his report. He would finish it up, and then he would get home and fall into bed and pass out. Let his body sort this out, whatever it was.

Just had to finish up.

_Suspect attempted to flee custody. Took a hostage._

Nick squeezed his eyes shut, blinking away the pain for a moment.

_Shot during attempted escape. No fatalities, three bullets fired, no police injuries. Fingerprints matched those on the murder weapon found in his trunk. Suspect confessed to murder._

Case closed.

They would follow up on it tomorrow. Find and notify next of kin for the victim.

Nick let himself slump back into his seat. One arm dangled down past the edge of his chair, even as he slung the other one to across his forehead, blocking out the light.

It _hurt_, that was the thing. He'd checked twice already, today, thinking that maybe they had replaced the bulbs in the station with some kind of new brand. But no, his eyes were stinging and his head was throbbing and it had nothing to do with the lighting.

Had to be the beers, then. No other reasonable explanation for it.

He would have to cut back. He'd gotten in the bad habit of drinking at Hank's, and then coming home and doing it some more. Nick had gotten into the habit because it generally took more to get him drunk than anyone else, but here it was, coming back to bite him in the ass.

And now, all he could think about was getting back home and letting his head hit the pillow- he could curl up and just let go, the pain would fade away with some sleep...

"Long night?"

Nick nearly fell out of his chair. He forced himself to straighten up, flustered. He'd nearly nodded off for a second there.

And the voice that had asked that had been familiar.

"Yes sir." he practically tongue-tied himself with his haste to respond. "Sorry, sir."

"Relax, Burkhardt." the captain was standing by his shoulder, an amused smile on his lopsided mouth. "I didn't mean to startle you. We've all been under a lot of pressure."

For how everyone always said that captain Renard was a cold man, Nick had never been able to really see it. Then again, it was hard to lie to Nick when he could see the unguarded expression on the beast's face within each and every person he met. Maybe the captain just had a really standoffish kind of face- the few times that Nick had caught a glimpse of it, Renard had certainly seemed to gather a distant sort of 'air of unconcern' about him.

"Just finished up my report, sir." Nick shuffled the papers together and clipped them into a folder, offering it to the man who was leaning against the side of his desk.

"Have you really?" the captain reached out a hand for it, glancing briefly through it before gesturing to the empty seat across from the two of them. "No detective Griffin tonight?"

"He already finished his- just putting the finishing touches on it. He'll turn it in tomorrow." Nick reassured. As he glanced over at the chair, his head gave a particularly heavy throb, and he had to stifle a wince.

"I'll look forward to it." was Renard's quiet reply. And then, a moment later, "I'm glad I caught you before you left, Burkhardt. I wanted to talk with you about something."

"Yes, sir?" Nick turned back to the captain, his heart clenching somewhere within the vicinity of his throat. Talk with him? About what? The captain couldn't have noticed there was something off, could he?

Or maybe- maybe the captain had finally noticed that Nick was just as different as he was- maybe caught him staring during one of his transformations, maybe noticed Nick watching when that strange light seemed to overwhelm him-

"I just wanted to say that you've been doing excellent work." came the last words that Nick had been expecting. "And that I'm glad to know you're a member of my department."

Nick blinked.

"I-" he stopped. Words failed him for a second, but he finally managed to blurt out- "Thank you. Sir."

"I mean it." the captain assured him. "Since you were put on task with detective Griffin, the rate of satisfactorily apprehended suspects around here has gone up significantly, and he's not shy about attributing it to your help. It's not hard to see why, either. From day one, you've put a hundred percent of yourself into your work, and its paid off in successfully closed cases. Now that you're a detective on your own merits, I look forward to seeing what you two can accomplish together."

A smile was creeping over Nick's lips as warmth swelled within his chest. He'd been trying to do the best he could, trying to be the best person he could be- he'd never expected anyone to commend him for that. Or even notice, really.

In the back of his mind, he knew it wasn't true, but he'd grown up with the belief that goodness was just as natural for other people as evil was for him. That in order to be half as good as the people around him, he would have to work twice as hard to manage something they could pull off effortlessly.

He'd seen too many cases by this point to believe in the inherent goodness of all mankind anymore. But it was still there, ingrained in the very smallest corner of him- that feeling that he would have to work harder than anyone else in order to perform this job well. To actually improve the world in some small way.

He'd never thought anyone would notice how hard he tried. Much less appreciate it.

"Thank you, sir." the words came so easily to him, but he wasn't sure he'd ever really meant them this strongly before. "I'll strive to give you the best I have to offer."

There was that little smile on Renard's lips again. That curl at his cheek.

He offered sharp nod as he straightened up, taking the folder with him.

"I'll keep this." he gestured to it. "You go home and get some rest. You look dead on your feet."

"Yes sir." Nick fumbled with his coat. The throbbing had abated momentarily, but now it was back with a vengeance.

Captain Renard watched him leave. The moment Nick was out of the station, the delighted grin that had been threatening to overcome him lit up his face.

Sure, he felt like a dork, driving the whole way home beaming like that. But at least he'd been spared the embarrassment of the captain seeing how touched he was over the comment.

_Lap dog,_ something inside of him chided him, along with a spike of disapproval over how he was reacting to simple attention. To little more than a verbal pat on the head._ Leashed and collared and neutered._

Nick almost absentmindedly shoved the internal commentary away, putting it out of his mind. Those self-deprecating thoughts had been getting particularly loud ever since the day he'd started seeing people's facade faces randomly.

It was happening more often, he mused, fumbling for his keys to the front door. More often that he would see them, that instead of familiar faces down at the station being taken in for questioning, he would be greeted in the interrogation room by a face like his own staring him down.

And that was perfectly normal, for them. What a concept. Every day of their lives, never seeing the wild range of beasts within everyone, to see everyone's faces as exactly the same. It boggled the mind.

Nick managed to kick off his shoes and pull himself out of his work clothes before the soothing darkness and the siren call of sleep began to seduce him towards his bed. He hadn't eaten dinner, but he ran a toothbrush through his mouth a few times anyhow just to get the grime of the day off.

From the moment his head hit the pillow, it was an uphill battle to keep his eyes open. That was one fight he surrendered to as soon as he could.

And he dreamed.

x

It was just a little headache.

Nick sat in his chair, trying to read the words in front of him. The page seemed to swim and waver before his eyes. _Skin of the neck and throat connected by dense fascia. Insert blade between c3 and c7 vertebrae at the weakest point of the spine._

Diagrams. _Remove skin before attempting to sever muscle. Spine detached last by separating the intervertebral disk. May require hammer and chisel or other similar action._

Nick closed his eyes. Pinching the bridge of his nose.

Then, he reached down to pick up the knife.

He hadn't killed in far too long. That must be it. That must have been why his hands had been shaking the last couple of days, why he'd started to get the headaches. Dispatching that little whore in the back alley hadn't helped- that had been trash disposal. He hadn't been able to take the time with her that he needed.

Well, of course he hadn't. She hadn't been remotely close to a worthy target.

He would get started. His hands were steady, now, and he could take his time with this one. It took patience, of course, studying the insides of the transformed. Inducing a Woge was hard enough, but keeping them conscious for long enough to draw what he saw inside, to study it? That was so much harder.

Just had to get started.

_Y incision. Collar bone to sternum. Sternum down the abdomen to just above the hips._

Nick squeezed his eyes shut. Took a deep breath.

He was too excited- he had to remember to keep his self control. He hadn't killed in far, far too long, and he wanted to make sure he didn't just butcher this one.

When he opened his eyes again, they met the stare of the man on his table. Those overcast, almost grey eyes.

Usually so cold, so distant. He'd never seen them filled with such tears of terror before.

"You'll have to bear with me." the words fell from Nick's tongue with a purr. "You can do that for me, can't you?"

The knife lowered down to that smooth, tan flesh.

"Now, Sean. Lets see what makes you so _special._"

x

When Nick woke up, he only just barely managed to scramble to the bathroom in time to throw up in the toilet.

It took nearly an hour for him to get back to sleep.

It wasn't until he woke up again, until the horrific details of his dream had been stolen away from him by a night of sleep, that he realized his headache was- if anything- worse.

And when captain Renard met his eye that day, Nick looked away first.


	9. Empathy

Once again, thank you everyone for all of the wonderful reviews. Here's a little game for this chapter- see if you can recognize our special guests of the week.

* * *

"You sure you're going to be okay?"

"Hank," Nick began, shooting his partner a look. "Just because I'm skipping coffee for a few days doesn't mean I'm going to die."

"Come on, I know that." Hank still had a concerned frown on his face. His face that was completely devoid of scales or fangs. Nick watched it with interest, watching how it contorted and shifted under the weight of emotions. How the brow furrowed and the jaw clenched.

It was an experiment. Just to see how long he could go before Hank's face reverted back to the Skalenzahne beneath the surface. So far, he had managed two and a half hours and counting, and he'd reached a conclusion.

Hank's facade face was kind of charming. It was no wonder so many women had fallen for him.

"You sure?" Hank pushed again, worry still etched across his expression, and Nick sat back with a sigh.

"Come on, Hank, it's an elimination diet." Nick shook his head. "Caffeine is a big one for triggering headaches. As soon as I'm sure it's not the coffee, we can go out for a celebratory cup. I'll buy."

"Fine." Hank deflated. His shoulders weren't as broad as when he was in full Skalenzahne form, nor was he as tall, and it was odd to be this close to him and not be constantly aware of his ever-present bulk.

Nick had always felt kind of small beside Hank. He was only just starting to realize that in reality, to the eyes of the families they interviewed and the suspects they interrogated together, they were about the same size.

Nick's head gave a particularly sharp throb, and he stifled a grimace. It had been almost non-stop since that first day, and- to be honest- he was about ready to be done with it by now. Pushing through it, focusing on work through the distraction of the pain- it had gotten so hard that he'd finally decided to do something about it.

He had a bottle of aspirin in his pocket, but not taking it was the point of the elimination diet. Once he figured out whether this was being caused by a food trigger or if it was stress, he would be able to work around it. Until then, though, he had to cut back on the most common foods that had been shown to impact headaches and closely monitor whether it got better or worse, and that meant not taking anything to lessen the pain artificially.

So far, it had been a steady level of the same. The same kind of pounding, distracting call for attention from the inside of his skull that had consumed him for the last week and a half.

The ringing of his phone was sharp and startling, and he found himself flinching from its sudden noise. He fumbled it in his pocket, finally answering it and ignoring the worried looks that Hank kept shooting him.

"Burkhardt." Nick offered. A few seconds later. "Where? Alright. I've got detective Griffin here with me, we're on our way."

"Ah, the call of crime." Hank muttered, stuffing his scone back into the paper bag the cafe had given him to carry it out in and starting up the car. "Where are we headed?"

"Twenty Seventh and Fremont." Nick grimaced. "There's a kid missing from Alameda Elementary. Left on the bus this morning, never made it to the school."

Hank's expression went flat. Without another word, he kicked the car into drive and they were off.

It would be Nick's first missing persons case.

x

Nick didn't realize that the missing child was a Wendigo until he nearly ran face first into the parents.

He froze up for a second. Standing there, wondering what the kidnappers were doing at the school, wondering where they could have taken the boy, how he could draw them out without revealing himself, and then-

Then, he'd seen the tears in their eyes, heard the mother's broken sobs, seen the stiff tension in the father's shoulders, and he felt horrible.

The feds were there. They were interviewing the parents, telling them that the first twenty four hours were crucial in cases like this, asking them if there was anyone their family knew who might have meant them harm or if there were any adults in little Owen Ledford's life who might have taken him.

Nick already had a bone-deep unease creeping over him as he kept half an ear on the questions, quietly following Hank as he introduced both of them to the FBI team leader.

They were throwing around theories on potential predators- sexual and otherwise- in the area. Who would have crossed paths with the kid. How they might have abducted him right off the bus without standing out.

Nick played along. And as soon as the feds had let the parents go, he drifted over to them.

He'd never been this close to a Wendigo. Only seen them once or twice out of the corner of his eye on the far end of a street, keeping to themselves.

But as he stood an arms length away and offered his reassurances, they seemed no different than any other parents stricken by loss and fear.

When he tried to push, though- just a little bit at a time, trying to lead them towards realizing what seemed so obvious to him, that their son might have been captured not because of his age but because of his race- just as he was about to ask "Are you absolutely certain there's nothing else in your family that could be relevant to this?", one of the feds pulled him away.

Nick followed him. And withstood the scolding he was given for 'harassing the family'. Even bit his tongue and held back when he was told that his overeagerness was excusable because he was still a rookie, but not to do it again.

The dressing down was quick, efficient, and brutal. And then, the agent walked away.

When Nick followed the group- Hank and he seemed to have been unofficially appointed a part of the investigation under the FBI- and his partner offered him a sympathetic wince, Nick had smiled at him and shrugged it off.

Oddly, that didn't seem to reassure Hank.

x

The feds searched along the wrong lines, following false leads for almost the full day, and Nick was pulling his hair out more and more. He had offered to drive the agents who had been working on victimology to ensure that he learned more about little Owen, although the way he had played it, they probably thought it was to get away from the agent who had slapped his wrist before.

The more he learned about Owen's life, the more he started to be certain what had happened to him. And it tore at his heart.

Elementary school. That was the last age when it was really acceptable to broadcast your race. When you were little, everyone was excited about their first Woge and their family heritage, coloring in pictures of themselves and their family all transformed and proudly displaying them on their walls.

Except for the kids who had reason not to.

Nick had drawn all the time when he was at this age. According to the walls of Owen's room, he was no different. Except not a single one of his scribbled pictures had depicted his family.

He'd drawn his house. His toys. The trees outside. Even his bicycle. But never once had he done a picture of himself or his parents.

Nick's heart clenched in his chest as he lay a hand on the door frame of the child's room.

Every description of Owen he was given- shy, withdrawn, but clever- reminded Nick of his own childhood. Had Owen learned what he was, he wondered? Had Owen had the same teary breakdown as he'd had, learning that he was one of the bad guys?

Had his parents told him, or had he found out on his own?

"You're pretty quiet." one of the agents offered. Nick's heart was in his throat.

"I really need to talk to the parents." he murmured.

But they diverted him away. Apparently he had been red flagged- everyone on the investigation had been told not to let him near them. When he tried, he was told to wait, and when he asked how long he had to wait for, they'd given him an indefinite sort of brush off.

Nick was tearing his hair out. If he was right, Owen wasn't in any immediate danger, but every second they wasted was one more second that he might be soon.

For the very first time in his life, he sat there, considering revealing himself to everyone. At least then they might listen to him, even if it was with guns trained on him.

As it turned out, he didn't need to go that far.

x

"Sorry. No can do."

"Please!" Nick begged the man at the door. This was so important, and before he could be certain, he had to speak to the parents. Everyone else was chasing extortion rings and pedophiles, and that wasn't going to help until it was already too late. "Please, just five minutes, that's all I need."

"Come on, back off. We're all on the same side, here- don't give me a hard time for following orders."

Nick stepped back. The aspirin in his pocket was too heavy to resist, the headache that had built up only exacerbated by being manhandled by everyone, and he popped a pair of pills into his mouth. One dry swallow later, at least he was promised relief in a few minutes.

The man at the door was eying him warily, and Nick held up the bottle to he could read the label with a sardonic half-glare.

"So you don't think I'm dosing as well as being a tactless jackass." the words were flat and cold, even as they left his lips, and the man winced.

"Sorry." he muttered.

"Listen-" Nick began, then took a deep breath. "Listen to me. Please. I know that you've been told to keep me away from the family, and I know why, too. I'm not trying to harass them. I just need to ask them something that may help us find Owen."

The Waschbar hesitated. Eyed him, brow furrowed.

"You really think it's that important?" he pushed. Nick nodded.

"I think it means everything."

Another pause. Just for a second.

Then, he looked down at his watch.

"I'm going to grab a coffee." he stated, faintly. "Can't be expected to watch the door when I'm just one room over, right? But once I see you in there, I'm going to have to report it to the captain."

Relief washed over Nick. He clasped a hand on the man's shoulder, along with a grateful nod.

"Thank you." he shot at the sergeant's retreating back.

The moment the officer was out of sight around the corner, Nick entered the room. The noise of the door opening had both parents looking up at him.

Jumpy. Every person who came in must have meant news from the investigation. Either the electrifying news of _We found your son_, or the nightmarish addendum of _I'm so sorry. We were too late._

Nick managed a half-watery smile and shook his head.

"We're still looking." he promised, quietly. "But if you don't mind, I need to ask you some questions about Owen."

"Of course." Mr. Ledford nodded, taking a deep breath to try and steel himself. Mrs. Ledford looked up at Nick almost blearily.

"You're the detective from this morning." she murmured, sounding almost surprised. Nick nodded.

"Yes, I am." he paused, and then- "Owen is a clever boy, wasn't he? A bit of a loner, but not by choice?"

"Oh yes. That's our little boy." Mrs. Ledford almost choked on her words, a pained smile tugging at her cheeks. "He's not so good at sports, but he loves reading. He'll read any chance he gets."

"Always off in the corner of the playground." Nick followed the train of thought. "More likely to climb the jungle gym in order to perch himself on top to get better light than to pretend he's climbed Mount Everest. Right?"

"Right." she nodded, perplexed. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"I'm just trying to understand Owen." Nick offered. "Who he is, what he does, what might cause him to deviate from his normal schedule. Tell me, did Owen ever read with anyone else? Or to anyone else? Any other kids at school, or from your block?"

"There was a girl named Kelly." Mr. Ledford offered, frowning. "They were the same age. She was good for him. More outgoing. Kelly would pull him into playing in the back yard when he would probably just have holed away in his room on his own."

"You said was." Nick pointed out. "What happened?"

"Her family moved away." the man shrugged. "A few months ago. Owen was devastated."

Nick tried not to wince. Of course he had been devastated. She had probably been his best, and only, friend.

"How was Owen doing in school?" Nick asked. "Did he ever seem- distracted, or reluctant to get on the bus?"

"Oh, every day." Mrs Ledford nodded hastily. "We were- we were thinking of taking him to the doctor to see if there was something wrong."

"I see." Nick nodded, straightening up. "Thank you both. I'll let you know if there are any other questions."

He needed to call someone first.

He needed to find out why Kelly's family left.

x

It was a photograph he had barely thought anything of at first. It had been on the evidence board the whole day and it hadn't even raised a flag with him. Now, though, he found himself pulling it down and staring at it.

He was still standing there with it in hand when the door opened behind him.

"You spoke with the parents again."

Ah.

"Yes, I did." he murmured, not bothering to turn around.

"After you were specifically warned not to."

"I needed to ask them questions relevant to the case." Nick pointed out.

"Oh, really?" the lead agent walked around the table to where he stood, glaring at him. The man was a Lowen. He must have been used to others backing down at the scent of predator all over him. It probably pissed him off that Nick didn't flinch. "Well that just makes it all _so much_ better then. If you had questions, you should have passed them through one of us first."

"To make sure they didn't count as harassment." Nick murmured, fingers brushing over the photograph again. "I understand. But you wouldn't have seen it until I checked."

"Excuse me?" the man's eyebrows were creeping up on his forehead.

"I've got another question for them." Nick offered. "But I'll have to go through you. Ask them- why aren't there any pictures of their family in Owen's room?"

There was silence for a moment. Nick turned around fully to face the team leader, who was frowning at him.

"I don't follow." he paused, then- "What angle are you working here? I agree, it is unusual for a boy of his age to never draw his family, but are you thinking he was adopted? Abducted by his birth parents?"

"No." Nick murmured, his eyes flickering down to the photo in his hands. "I'm nearly positive that he's their biological son. But I don't think he was abducted."

"Excuse me?" the rest of the team, including Hank, had begun to filter into the room after another fruitless search failed. The agent who had deemed him quiet before was the one who was considering him thoughtfully. "What do you mean? You think he ran away? Abuse, maybe?"

"Stress, but not intentional abuse." Nick sighed, turning the photo in his hands around for them all to see.

They had taken it as evidence. It had been scratched into the paint outside of Owen's locker as if by nails or a knife. Everyone else had just thought it was a message from the kidnapper, but Nick knew better.

It was of a badly drawn skull with antlers.

"This is what tipped me off." Nick lied. "I know this symbol. The skull with antlers. It's the old Algonquian tribe face for their 'evil spirit', the Wendigo."

"Wendigo?" Hank's voice was sharp, even as he stiffened. He wasn't the only one.

"Then the boy's already dead." the team leader growled, his whole body shuddering.

"I thought so too, at first." Nick nodded, glancing over the image again. "Except this symbol? It wasn't done by an adult. Look at it. The scratches. They're a little above eye level for a boy of Owen's age, but all of the highest marks start from the bottom and get lighter as they head to the top. If an adult had done this, they would have had to be kneeling down. But if it was done by a child..."

"A child?" one of the FBI caught on, moving around the table to look at the photo. He tossed it down onto the wood, letting them all see it.

"Cruel symbols scratched into his things at school." Nick murmured, softly. "A boy who prefers the company of books to other children his age. Quiet, but clever, and doesn't draw any pictures of his family. Not because he doesn't want to make them, but because he doesn't want anyone else to ever see them, so why take the risk?"

"What are you getting at?" the team lead pressed.

Nick looked up at the man. Met his eyes.

"You go to the parents." he offered, quietly. "You go in there and you sit down and you tell them that they need to tell you everything if we're going to find their son. You ask them if there's anything in their family that might have put Owen in danger. And remind them that the modern justice system forbids the prosecution of people based solely on their race."

"You think that they're being hunted by a Wendigo?" the agent from before frowned at him.

"No." Nick shook his head. "I think they are Wendigo."

x

It didn't take more than a few moments for the agents to get the Ledfords to open up.

"But it doesn't mean anything!" Mrs. Ledford kept insisting, over and over again. "We don't follow the old traditions- we need meat diets, yes, but beef and pork is a perfect substitute. We've never done anything. And Owen's just a little boy, he's no threat to anyone! He doesn't even know what he is, yet!"

Nick knelt down in front of her. Since the agents had learned what race the Ledfords were, they'd been reluctant to close the distance.

"Mrs. Ledford." Nick began, quietly. He reached up for her hands, and she tentatively took them in her own. It was a wonder how slight and fragile her grip felt, beneath his fingers. Such a dangerous creature- one he never would have thought to describe as delicate until just now. "I have a question for you, and it's very important. Has Owen gotten _nervous_, recently? Maybe protective- has he started checking the doors at night to make sure they're locked?"

"Y... yes, he has." she met Nick's stare with wide-eyed surprise. "We... I kept saying he was growing up into a responsible little man."

"Was that a little while before Kelly's family left?" Nick pressed on, and she nodded.

"Just about a week."

Nick took a deep breath. His shoulders slumped.

"He knows." he whispered.

Everyone was silent.

"What do you mean, he knows?" Mr. Ledford asked, looking between Nick and his wife in confusion.

Nick straightened up. Met the man's stare head on.

"I mean he knows." he repeated. "I checked in on Kelly's family. They moved away because Kelly refused to ever go back to school again. She did it because he was there. Owen found out what he was, and shared it with her, and she rejected him."

Mr. Ledford's hand lifted up to cover his mouth. He was staring at Nick in horror.

"When you're that young, and in a situation like that-" Nick paused. Then- "You feel cornered. Every little threat seems so much bigger than it actually is. And when your parents refuse to talk to you about it, it only makes things harder to handle. Paranoia, overprotectiveness- locking the doors at night to make sure they're all closed and never drawing his parents so that if anything ever happens to him, nobody will be able to tie them to him, so even if he gets hurt then they won't be in danger-"

Nick licked his lips. Squared his shoulders.

"I think that before she left, Kelly told someone at school about what he was." Nick offered. "Someone who's been bullying him in secret. More and more, he didn't want to go to school, right? Reluctant to head there, but never telling you why? And when he got there today, he must have gone to his locker- and seen that symbol etched there- and thought '_they found me_'. I don't think anyone kidnapped Owen. I think Owen thought there was someone after him, and he ran to try and lead them away from you."

Mrs. Ledford choked on a sob. Staring at him with a wide-eyed gaze.

"If Owen was in trouble," he began, patiently. "If he really, truly thought his life was in danger, and he didn't want to come to you, do you have any idea where he might go?"

x

They found him at his grandparents abandoned farm.

He had made a den in the crawlspace under the main building.

When the others tried to lure him out by saying they were police and he was safe now, Nick could have smacked them. Owen thought he was one of the bad guys. Having the good guys show up on your doorstep wasn't something you looked forward to when you were a bad guy.

Instead, he told Owen that the people who had found him hadn't been able to find his parents. He'd done so well. He'd protected them.

Now that threat had passed, and his parents needed him back to protect them again. To make sure they were safe. And he could do that better from their house than he could from this little nest, couldn't he?

Owen crawled out, covered in bruises and scratches, clean tear trails cut through the dirt on his cheeks. Nick picked him up and carried him out to the car. Asked him about his favorite book.

By the time they returned him to his parents, Owen was practically talking over himself to tell Nick the plot of the story he read last week, who didn't let go of him the whole ride back.

He didn't relinquish his grip until he could deliver Owen directly into his mother's arms.

x

"How did you know?"

Nick glanced up. The agent from the house- the one who'd described him as '_quiet_'- was watching him.

Nick offered a dry smile.

"You can't have gotten into the bureau on looks alone." he remarked. "Take a guess."

The man let out a little scoff of amusement. Came over to lean against the wall beside Nick.

"...you were just like him, weren't you?" he asked, finally. "When you were talking to the parents, before, describing Owen's behavior. And when you were talking to the kid. It was like- you had personal experience."

Nick was quiet. Then, he glanced back at the agent.

"What's your name?" he asked, softly.

"You never got it?" the Fuchsbau half-grinned at him. Nick shook his head.

"Too busy getting a lecture from Special Agent Lofthouse." he stated.

"Don't be too hard on him." the man shrugged. "He can be a little narrow-sighted, but it's because he cares too deeply and gets too caught up in there being no room for error."

"I understand." Nick nodded sharply.

"And it's Durwell." the man held out his hand. "Special Agent Max Durwell."

"Durwell." Nick shook his hand. "If you're ever in town again, give me a call. I'd love to give you a tour."

"I look forward to it." Durwell grinned. "Maybe I could have your number, just so I don't have to bother the station for it."

Nick offered Durwell a card with his personal number on it. As he handed it over, the man's hand wrapped around his fingers for just a moment.

"You know, when I learned that he was a Wendigo, I admit- for a second, I thought this case wouldn't end well." the agent murmured, softly. "But you know? I'm starting to think that Owen's going to grow up just fine."

A small smile graced Nick's lips. There was a tinge of sadness to it- he wouldn't have wished his life on Owen, no matter how similar he may have been as a child. But all the same, the veiled compliment from Durwell was warming.

As he watched the Fuchsbau's back retreating down the hall into the other room, Nick brushed his fingertips against the skin where Durwell had touched him.

It had taken everything he had not to rip his hand away from the agent and grab the closest sharp object. It was getting worse. Even though he had been the one to initiate the flirting, even though he had been expecting the touch, even though Durwell was just a Fuchsbau- not even a major predatory threat...

Nick closed his eyes. Wincing.

The light was getting to him. He was just tired after so long of this headache plaguing him. Of course he was a little bit tetchy. As soon as he figured out what was causing it, he would be able to get some relief, and his mood would improve as well. Who didn't wind up in a bad mood after being in pain for so long?

Nick fumbled with the bottle of aspirin. His fingers practically thrummed with the memory of the simple touch- the brush of fur and the stroke of flesh.

He could cut that fur off and wear it- curl up with it around him as a blanket when the heater was busted. Nuzzle into it and savor sweet memories of how its previous occupant screamed-

He slammed his head back against the wall.

For a second, the headache splintered into blinding spikes of pain, but a moment later he had finally managed to get the cap off of the bottle.

Before he could shake even one out into his palm, a hand darted in and snatched the bottle from his fingertips.

_Ferocious possessiveness_ demanded that he break every single bone in that hand. When he turned to its owner, though-

"You had two less than six hours ago, remember?" those dark eyes were fixed on him.

Nick grimaced. Closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Did I?" he muttered, trying to figure out how long it had been. It was the Waschbar from before, the one who had been guarding the door to the elder Ledfords.

Oh. Oh, right. He had popped a couple while he was trying to gain access to the parents.

"Must be pretty bad if you can't even remember." the sergeant mentioned. When Nick opened his eyes, the man was reading over the back of the bottle. "But you still managed to crack the case. Impressive."

"Thanks. I think." Nick muttered.

"If the feds hadn't interfered, you probably could have found him this morning."

"They were just doing their job." he brushed it off. The Waschbar was eyeing him.

"If the pain's so bad, why are you using this over the counter stuff?" he pushed. "You should see a doctor. Get a prescription."

"For what?" Nick shot back. "Narcotic pain relief? Something that reads 'side effects may include dizziness, shortness of breath, numbness to extremities, and drowsiness'? Something that's going to take me out of the field?" he shook his head.

"Point taken." the sergeant handed him back the bottle and gave the back of his shoulder a light smack. "Just don't overdose. I'd hate to have to explain why our new star detective wound up in a coma in the bathroom."

"Got it." Nick mumbled, screwing the lid back on. Then, he glanced back up at the Waschbar, his brain catching up with the wording. "Star detective?"

The sergeant snorted. Stuffed his hands into his pockets.

"People talk." he brushed it off. "You've got a reputation. You know, I joined the force the same year you did? You probably don't even know my name."

Nick blinked. Searched his memories. He could have sworn he'd never even seen this man before today.

But when he went back- all the way back, back to his graduating class in the academy- something finally sparked.

"It's Wu, isn't it?" he asked. The sergeant's face lit up.

"Yeah." he grinned. "Yeah, it is. Good memory."

"Didn't know you entered the same time I did." he admitted.

"Well, that's partially my fault." Wu shrugged it off. "I only just got promoted to sergeant this year. Worked on a different floor before that. You'll probably see me around a lot more."

Nick offered his hand. A faint smile on his lips.

"Congratulations on your promotion, sergeant Wu." Nick offered. "Feel free to come bother Hank and me any time you're bored."

"Careful." Wu accepted the hand, still grinning. "I may just take you up on that."


	10. Unnatural Attraction

"You can't be serious."

"Hank." Nick began, wondering if it was still possible to back out of this case. "This may come as a surprise to you, but I'm not a playboy, and I don't have a lot of flings. I legitimately do not know what that thing is supposed to be."

It had been a case like any other. At least, in the beginning.

Then they'd discovered that the link which tied together the missing girls was that they had all been workers in the sex trade industry.

And now suddenly, Nick was learning way more about the fetishistic underbelly of Portland than he'd been ready to absorb when he'd woken up that morning.

"Oh my God, you really have no idea?" Hank was grinning at him, standing there holding that thing in his hand. It was a string that looked like a scaled down version of one of those telephone wires they put up near airports with all the orange balls on it to warn the planes away. "Nick, I- I'm learning about this- this whole new side to you, man. You can wrap your head around the goriest stuff, but when it comes to sex, you are _adorably_ naive."

"And what makes you such an expert?" Nick muttered, looking away. He just wasn't really as outgoing when it came to flirting as Hank was. He'd seen Hank meet a girl's eye across a crowded room and go home with her that evening. It was baffling.

"Uh, hello?" Hank's eyebrows arched at him. Nick had been trying to watch his facade face as much as possible- he could keep it up indefinitely, if he really tried. "Four ex-wives? Four failed marriages? You really think I never thought to blame it on being too tame in the sack?"

So maybe he was a little bit naive- that wasn't a bad thing, it just meant he hadn't yet gotten bored enough in bed with a partner that he felt it was necessary.

Maybe it was a _little_ bit of a bad thing. That was because he hadn't spent long enough with any of them to get that far, after all.

"Okay, this conversation has strayed deep into territory it can't be rescued from." he shook his head, trying to put that depressing thought to the side. Hank was chuckling.

"Sex crimes, my man." he set the- whatever it was- aside. "You're going to have to learn somehow. You'll see a lot here in Portland when it comes to cases involving hinky stuff. Better to be well-versed than clueless."

When the high-end escort they had convinced to talk to them walked in two minutes later and Nick took one good look at her, he wanted to smack Hank upside the head.

There were upsides to being well-versed, he supposed, but one of the downsides was that from the second Hank saw a pretty lady hitting on him, he was hooked.

Under any other circumstances, Nick would have wished them his blessing and gotten lost for an hour or two so the long lost soulmates could bond for a while.

But not when the escort was a Geier.

x

The hardest part of the case was finding enough evidence to support his theory fast enough to save Hank.

When he'd tried to explain to Hank that the reason he didn't want his partner fooling around with the escort was because something about the girl just gave him the creeps, Hank had gotten all defensive.

"Come on, man, just because she gets paid for what she does, that doesn't make her any worse than any other lady out there." he'd protested, and Nick would have been tempted to smack himself in the head if it hadn't been throbbing so badly. "Besides, Elysia's not interested in me being her client. We're going out for dinner on Friday."

For the first time, Nick found himself wondering if the reason why his ancestors had killed so many people was out of sheer frustration with them for not being able to see the bigger picture.

x

Nick had started off simply trying to find a paper trail, or some kind of evidence that the missing girls had been connected to Elysia. If not enough to put her in a holding cell, then maybe enough to shove under Hank's nose to try and get him to call off the date.

By Wednesday, Nick was so desperate that he resorted to telling Hank that he was going to follow a lead and that he shouldn't wait up. And then he'd buttoned up his coat and started literally following his lead- the only lead he had. Tailing the escort on foot.

A Geier could be good, he reasoned. After all, he had seen plenty of so-called 'evil by nature' people who were good. But when Elysia smiled, her teeth were bloody, just like the splatter that dripped from her hands. And what seeped into the ground from her boots.

It wasn't very hard to follow her. The blood wasn't real- it was just a psychic impression that was left behind, a stain on the world where she walked, and it faded within moments- but those moments were long enough for him to use it to determine which direction she'd gone every single time he lost sight of her.

It really did feel like cheating, sometimes. The advantages that he'd been given at birth made it so much easier for him to do things like this.

_They don't call it cheating when a Siegbarste joins a football team_, he reminded himself._ They call it natural talent._

He snorted. It hadn't sounded any more believable when he'd heard it on the hive, either.

Nick kept notes of all the places where she stopped for longer. Most of them were boutiques, there was two salons- one for hair and the other one for nails- and then there was a stop at a restaurant for lunch, which Nick forewent in order to keep an eye on her.

And then she finished up her shopping and headed home.

Nick was frustrated. Sitting there, watching her front door, waiting for her to come back out. But she never did.

Of course he wasn't going to find out what he needed on the first day, Nick reasoned, and finally headed back to check in with Hank and try to convince him again.

When Hank looked up to find Nick standing, he grinned and held up a slip of paper.

"I've got it." were the first words out of his mouth.

x

The first victim, Natalie Kellson, had been- by all accounts- particularly lewd. She'd hit on anything with something dangling between two legs. Including, according to her mother, her own older brother.

"Musai can't help themselves." her mother had protested with that breathless sort of fluttery voice that Nick supposed was meant to be attractive. "When puberty strikes, whoever's closest is the target of their most powerful desires. Jason understood that, I made sure to raise him to know how to handle it when her becoming started to fuel her libido."

Jason, as well, had been calm and composed. He'd patiently explained to them that his baby sister had been a tail chaser since she was barely thirteen, and she'd seemed more driven by it than he ever had at that age. When the time had come for her to leave home, she'd fallen into the trade of prostitution not as a grudging way to make money, but more as an excuse to fall into bed with whoever would take her as often as possible.

Which left the question- if she had been the first victim, and the first victim was usually the most important, what did that mean for the investigation?

x

Everything, it turned out.

Sye Dunther had been the focus of Natalie's attentions back in middle school. Her first 'boyfriend', and when her brother had rebuked her, he had been the first person she'd turned her charms on.

At such a young age, his mind had been able to somewhat adapt to the Musai's kiss to the point where he hadn't devolved into a desperate frenzy. What he had done, though, was track her down for years until he could find her again, desperate to touch the sun, desperate to experience that first rapture all over again.

But Natalie had been at the peak of her libido when her becoming had first changed her. When they'd come together again, and she was all too happy to play along, it hadn't been the experience Sye had remembered. That he'd been dreaming of all those years.

He'd been taking more and more girls, thinking that maybe if he just added a harem to that fantasy, then reality would be able to live up to it.

When Hank and Nick had arrested Sye, Natalie had nearly scratched their eyes out to try and make them let him go. While it might have been hell for the other girls, it had been a dream come true for her.

Sye had gone to the station to be processed. Natalie had gone to the hospital in a straightjacket, where the doctors discovered that her overactive sex drive was due to a serotonin imbalance that was easily treatable.

For how lucky they were to have found everyone alive, Nick couldn't help but think that if he hadn't spent that day chasing around a dead end lead, they might have found them even sooner.

x

Friday came too soon.

Nick hadn't been able to convince Hank to drop the date. Every time he tried, Hank just laughed at him for being so naive and promising him that he would be careful.

Nick had been forced to watch Hank pulling on his coat, heading home half an hour early to prepare for his date. He hadn't realized that he'd been glaring at the door until a hand had landed on his shoulder.

"Come on, man. It's not a good idea."

Nick sighed. If there was one good thing about Sergeant Wu, it was that he was such a physically affectionate guy that he was giving Nick a lot of practice at getting used to clamping down on his immediate reaction when someone touched him.

"What's not?" he asked, wondering if Wu could tell that he wanted to stalk Hank and Elysia to dinner to make sure nothing bad happened.

"Making your partner your _partner_. It never ends well."

Nick's first reaction was _what?_ Immediately followed by _what._

"This isn't jealousy, it's worry." Nick almost snapped at him. Hank was his friend. He didn't really want to sleep with him. His relationship with Hank consisted of beers and jokes and bad movies, and if he slept over, it was always on the couch.

Wu raised an eyebrow at him.

"Hank can take care of himself, man. Have you even seen him when he gets going?"

Nick gritted his teeth. Rubbed at the bridge of his nose.

"I have." he muttered, bitterly. "Wu- I just- Hank gets his heart broken so often. And I don't think this girl has any good intentions."

"So, what's the problem? Just tell him." Wu looked confused for a second. "You've got the best instincts of anyone here. If she's giving you the heebie-jeebies, there's probably something to it."

"Hank won't listen." Nick stated, flatly. "You know the case we were just on? The sex worker case?"

"Yeah?" Wu was watching him, perplexed.

"I'm not really well versed in that world, and now every time I try to warn him, he thinks I'm being harsh on Elysia because she's an escort and I'm too sweet and naive. But I'm not- I'm not trying to get him to stop because of her job-" he was getting desperate now, trying to find the words to explain- "Wu, that girl, that Natalie girl? She doesn't weird me out even _half_ this bad."

When he looked up, Wu was frowning. His brows furrowed, just watching Nick.

Then, he rolled his shoulders back and straightened up.

"You sure you're right about this?" he asked, faintly. Nick grimaced.

"No." he muttered. "But I just- I'm just worried."

Wu hesitated. Then, he grabbed his keys off his desk.

"Monsieur Burkhardt," he began, in his faintest, most fluttery voice. "Would you do me the honor of joining me for dinner?"

Nick blinked.

Then, he nearly collapsed in relief.

"I'll grab my coat."

x

They sat at the bar on the far end of the room, watching Hank and his date in the mirror behind the bottles.

Nothing seemed wrong for the longest time. Until Hank leaned in to whisper something in her ear and she took the opportunity to sniff him.

Wu had stiffened. Nick, to his surprise, had found himself putting his hand on the Sergeant's shoulder to keep him in his seat.

"It's just something that some races do." he warned, softly. "Scenting pheromones. It doesn't mean anything."

Wu had grumbled and ordered himself another rum and coke.

x

The night had gone without a hitch.

Nick had dropped Wu off back at his house after they made sure Hank really had just returned Elysia to her place and not invited himself in for coffee. The Sergeant had been too drunk to walk straight, and Nick had needed to half-carry him upstairs to his apartment.

When Nick returned to his own home, he'd laid down and stared at the ceiling.

He'd messed up again. He had to have messed up again. There had been nothing wrong with Elysia at all.

Had his instincts steered him astray?

Paranoia. That's what this was, wasn't it? Someone new had come into Hank's life, and Nick had been paranoid of her. Paranoid of what she represented.

A blood-stained Geier, luring Hank to his death. Hank, refusing to listen to reason.

Hadn't he even thought to himself, even jokingly, that there might have been a logical reason for why his ancestors had killed so many?

Nick squeezed his eyes closed. Rubbing at them.

The headache pulsed through him, like a crown of pain stabbing into him with every heartbeat. There was something wrong with him. There was something so wrong with him.

All of this had only started when he'd begun to force himself to see people's facade faces. Maybe that was the problem. Maybe that was what was messing with him. Maybe it just wasn't his place to see their faces without the scales and horns and feathers and fur.

He would apologize to Hank the next morning. And then to Wu, for dragging him along.

And then he would stop playing around and experimenting with forcing himself to see people's facade faces. He would just relax, and let his eyes catch a break.

Nick swore that to himself just moments before he fell asleep.

x

"Hey, don't worry about it, man." Wu slapped him on the back with a grin on his lips. "I mean, hell. I was going to be heading out to a bar anyways- you gave me the excuse to go to a really classy one. Having some company wasn't too bad, either."

Nick smiled in relief and made a mental note to try and do things with Wu more often. He seemed like for all he did to keep things running around the station, he was still in that semi-lonely stage of nobody really paying him much mind in an institution where everyone wore the same uniform and he hadn't done anything noteworthy enough to be recognized for yet.

"Show me where you usually go sometime, yeah?" Nick asked, to which Wu's face lit up.

"Sure thing. You'll love it, man. They've got this mead there, the owner's brother brews it all. The stuff's sweet as honey, but it kicks like a horse."

"You two went to a bar together?" the voice from behind them sounded exhausted.

Nick turned around. Hank was standing there, dark circles under his eyes. He was shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot.

"Yeah, we did." Nick hastened to offer an explanation. "Wu kept me company, since you were going out on your big date."

"Yeah, how was that, by the way?" Wu managed to keep his voice relatively steady, and what little he failed to manage could easily be explained by a hangover.

Hank sighed.

"I just don't think it's going to work out." he admitted, finally. "It's just- I dunno, man. I guess when you were right there beside me, I couldn't see it, but the longer I spent with her alone, the more the hair on the back of my neck stood to attention. She was just kind of creepy."

"Really?" Nick's heart was racing in his chest, even as Wu shot him a significant look that he wished the Sergeant would be more discreet about. "I'm sorry if I put you off from her or something."

"Nah, you were right." Hank shrugged, moving along from the hallway into the bullpen. "Trust your instincts, right? Anyway, I don't think I'm going to see her again. Plenty more fish in the sea."

"True, that." Wu was nodding sagely. "You'll find someone else. Hell, you could give it a shot at Ben's place!" he had suddenly gotten excited. "That's the bar I was inviting Nick to, before. You could come with us, have a few drinks. Scout out the ladies."

"I could." Hank looked thoughtful. "I could use a drink, after last night."

"It's settled, then." Wu was beaming at them both. "Us three, tonight, six thirty."

"I'll be looking forward to it." Nick found himself smiling as well.

And later that night, he and Wu sat back and watched and laughed as Hank chatted up a pretty young Wildermann, and for the first time in weeks, Nick didn't even have a headache.


	11. The End of the Rise

"Dude, are you sure you don't want to see a doctor?"

Nick tossed back a glass of water to wash the pills down. He could dry swallow, of course, but there was no point in leaving the aftertaste in his mouth if he didn't have to.

"I don't know what they could tell me." he brushed off Wu's concerned question with a shrug. "I get migraines. There isn't a dietary or environmental trigger, and I refuse to quit my job just on the off chance they'll stop happening if I'm less stressed. If I go see a doctor, all they'll do is charge me money to tell me what I already know." he paused, then- "And no, I'm not going to get prescription pain medication."

"Sorry, sorry." Wu sighed, shaking his head. "I just keep thinking- Just because aspirin isn't over the counter doesn't mean that it's any better for you long-term, you know?"

"Yeah, I know." Nick offered Wu a faint smile. It was hard to find the Sergeant's inner mother hen, but it was there, buried beneath layers of snark and sarcasm. Apparently, the thought of Nick pill popping was enough to bring it out.

Wu was frowning at the tiny bottle in his hand as he slipped it back into his coat pocket. He opened his mouth, prepared to say something else-

Nick's phone went off.

He shot the Waschbar an apologetic shrug, digging back into his pocket past the aspirin for it. When he looked down at the text he'd just received, a wince flashed across his face.

"That bad?" Wu asked, faintly.

Nick pushed the phone back into his pocket. Finished off the last of his coffee and dumped the cup into the trash.

"There's a body."

x

What had really surprised him was how rarely his job consisted of investigating homicides.

So much more often, it demanded he deal with minor shoplifting and domestic disputes and violated paroles and broken restraining orders. So much more often, there was the opportunity to mend things, to repair the damage done. Return stolen merchandise and scare the kids out of any further mischief, offer protective custody until everything could be sorted out- both times he'd been called out to find a parolee, it turned out they hadn't even run. He'd found them at their house and apartment, and respectively, one of them hadn't met with his officer because his wife had been in labor and the other one had been drunk out of his mind and literally forgotten about it.

Basically no harm, no foul.

But as he stood over what little remained of a body, Nick's heart sank. It was rare enough that the only case he'd worked when he was a cop that had a death toll had been an old woman who'd walked into the road. Nobody had ever been able to definitively give an answer whether it had been a moment of senility, or if her eyes had given out on her, or if she'd just decided that she'd lived for long enough and didn't want to die bedridden.

Not in this case. Nowhere near so lucky.

Flesh and blood and bone with a single running shoe whose size and color indicated that the scraps left behind had been a young woman recently. A young woman who had been all but torn apart, scraps of her clothes strewn everywhere. The blood barely visible against the vibrant red of the cloth.

The longer he stared at it, the more he couldn't stop thinking about the person it had been. Had she been tall or short? Shy, or outgoing? Cautious, or willing to stop on the street to give a stranger directions?

Did she have time to scream?

If she was as athletic as the running shoe indicated, then she must have struggled. Maybe not if she'd been taken by surprise, but if she'd seen any chance at all, then wouldn't she have fought back?

She'd been torn to ribbons. What little of her still remained wasn't even in one piece. The insects and birds must have gotten to her before they had, the animals foraging for food coming across her body and dragging away scraps.

And still, he wondered. Had she screamed?

What race had she been before she died? Predator or prey? Hunter or hunted?

Whatever had hunted her, it had borne witness to the last moments of her life. Watched as that life had been snuffed out, as the light had left her eyes, as the planet kept spinning- but a single person's whole world had ground to a halt.

And had she screamed?

Had it been long, and loud, until her lungs ached and burned? Had it been cut off before it could even begin- a drawn breath, and then nothing?

Or had she been alive?

Alive, as she whimpered and begged, pleading for mercy, pleading for it to end-

"Nick!" someone called, and he shook himself free of the daze which had overcome him. For just a moment, revulsion churned within him, disgust with himself, but he shoved it down.

He had just been considering those things because he was trying to get into the head of the victim to better determine who or what her killer had been. That was all. It was an important part of the investigation.

Nick turned, looking back to where Hank was waving him over.

His headache was back in full force, as if he'd never taken a single pill for it. Not for the first time, Nick cursed his promise to Wu that he would be careful not to risk overdosing.

He could already tell that this was going to be a long day.

x

It wasn't the first attack of it's kind.

Two in as many months. The first one had been up at Munson Creek Falls, attributed to a bobcat that had never been found. The park they'd found their girl in, though, had been surrounded by a populated area on all sides. No bobcats or mountain lions down there. He'd been careful, when looking over the crime scene photos again, not to get too caught up in them.

It was only once they'd gotten a hit on a missing persons report at the university that Nick had begun to get an inkling suspicion of what had happened.

Standing there, holding Sylvie Oster's picture in his hand, the very first thing that caught his eye was also the one that made his heart clench.

"These hoodies you're both wearing," he began, casually. "Sorority jackets?"

"Uh, yeah." the girl had stared up at him with wide, confused eyes. "Omega Beta Theta pride."

Nick handed back the phone. Stuffed his hands into his pockets.

From the quizzical look that Hank was shooting him, he hadn't fully managed to wipe the grimace off his face.

"Thank you for your help." he nodded to the roommate, pulling out his card and offering it to her. "If you can think of anything- anything at all- or if you need anything, give us a call."

"T... thanks." the young woman looked it over, then looked up at Nick again, quizzically. "What's so important about our hoodies?"

Nick hesitated. He wanted to say it, to blurt it out, to scream it from the hills. But instead, he shook his head.

"It's an ongoing investigation." he managed to force out. "We'll let you know when we have definitive information."

Hank, though, was not so easily swayed. When he slipped into the driver's side of the car, it was with a searching look directed at Nick.

"Okay." he finally spoke up, "I'll bite. What's the deal with the coat?"

Nick winced. This was it. The number one single most frustrating thing about being a Grimm.

He knew so many things about every race out there. Their quirks, their habits, their rituals. And more than anything, their triggers. If he had his way, he would share that information freely any time it became needed.

But it wasn't common knowledge that Blutbaden literally saw red when they saw the color red. That wasn't something that he could just blurt out and expect people to overlook the fact that he knew it. He'd gotten away with professing to know the obscure Wendigo symbol because he had implied he was one- by neither confirming nor denying it, he might as well have outright stamped the label across his forehead. And so, nobody had pushed, because they all presumed they knew the answer.

If he now professed to knowing secretive racial tidbits about Blutbad, as well, it wouldn't go over with as little of a fuss.

He would have to direct the investigation towards the idea of potential predators in the area. Until then, though...

"I nearly missed it, too." Nick stated, quietly. "This morning, when we were looking at the scene. It was easy to overlook, with all that blood. But there were scraps of red cloth strewn everywhere. That exact same shade of bright red."

Hank's expression fell.

The drive back to the station was in silence.

x

It had been such a long day.

He was reasonably assured, at least, that when the DNA test on the wounds came back, it would show a Blutbad's saliva. Or the teeth marks would match. Or something to set them on the right track.

As they packed up to head home, Wu was teasing Hank about the young Wildermann he'd been seeing for a few weeks now. All Nick could think was that he'd met Rachel, and he could condone Hank keeping her company a lot more than the previous option. She got him out of the house more, too- always insisting on taking hikes and picnics. And that was something Nick would never see as a bad thing, after remembering how long Hank had spent barely going anywhere other than his house and the station.

Nick rubbed his forehead, trying to alleviate the burning there. That felt like it had been so long ago, when he'd first met Hank. It was hard to imagine that this was the same person- this partner of his who was so outgoing, so uplifting- was the same one who'd nearly fallen apart after his last marriage had broken up.

He managed a small smile through the pain. Hank wasn't the only one who'd changed a lot in a short time. Since coming to Portland, Nick had found a job worth doing in a place worth protecting with people worth standing up for. Everything he'd ever worried about when it came to relating to outsiders he'd seen proved wrong, all one after another as his misconceptions had toppled like dominoes.

That was the thought he kept in mind as he drove to his apartment. As he stopped the car, he looked up at the balcony window that stared over the street.

It wasn't going to be long, now. He'd had that apartment for so long, but he'd finally found a little house for himself. With a yard and trees and everything. He'd put down the deposit- all he had to do now was to move his stuff out and pay his final month's rent on the apartment.

He would miss the Garretts. The couple had taken good care of him, their doors always open any time of day or night if he needed to talk, or even just if he was in the mood for hot chocolate. His eyes trailed down to the bakery, lingering on the warm lights that still lit up the street.

The Garretts and Calyssa were all sitting together at the big table, mugs in their hands and a plate of cookies between them. All smiling and laughing.

He might as well go in and sit with them one last time. Make his peace with Calyssa, remind himself one last time that these people had been as good as family to him for all the years since he'd come to Portland.

When he pushed through the door with a smile, all three of them looked up. Mrs. Garrett lit up, beaming at him.

"Nick!" she exclaimed, delightedly. "You're back! Oh, just in time, there's a surprise for you!"

"A surprise?" he blinked. They couldn't possibly have known he would be down tonight, so what sort of surprise could it be?

Calyssa, grinning from ear to ear, moved her chair aside so Nick could see the woman sitting beside her.

Their visitor was fit and lean, a shawl draped over her head until it looked like a veil. Everything she wore looked like hand-sewn patterns, colorful once but now dulled by age and wear, draped across her body in complex designs and tied in tiny, intricate knots like a fallen royal's robes.

For a second, Nick couldn't breathe. His heart had torn in half, squeezing itself into his throat and dropping out the pit of his stomach at the same time. A chill went down his spine.

She sat there on the other side of the table, with a cup of tea in her hands and a gleam in her eye. She hadn't aged a day from how he remembered her.

"Hello, Nicky." his aunt Marie smiled at him. "It's good to see you again. Your friends were just telling me all about you."


	12. The Beginning of the Fall

For a single moment, Nick couldn't breathe.

He had tunnel vision. His aunt, sitting there. His aunt Marie,_ sitting there_ at the table in the bakery as though she_ belonged_ there, as innocent as a warhead at a picnic.

This was _his world_.

This was his life he had built for himself. This was his_ sanctuary_, his home, his peace that he had scraped together.

The Garretts were good people, truly_ good_ in a way that made his heart ache after a day of walking the streets, staring for hours at the worst souls on the streets with the deepest scars and the hardest hearts, and then coming home to the uncomplicated light and joy that the bakery offered. Walking in and relaxing into the relief of a pair of kind, unblemished faces and open arms.

And Calyssa. She was good. Purely _good_. Not in the same way as the Garretts, not with that same sort of tranquility, nor was she as unmarked by her journey. No, Calyssa was a fighter, and the beast within her bore the scars of all the battles she had fought to get to where she was today. But instead of being whipped into submission, beaten down until she could be trodden underfoot, she stood tall and proud, burdened by the causes she had fought for in the past and yet still ready and willing to meet the causes she would fight for in the future.

And his aunt, just sitting there, staring back at him with his own face. His aunt, sitting there staring at him with that little smile on her lips like she belonged right where she was, and wouldn't be budged from her seat.

Nick felt like he was going to throw up.

"Well?" Calyssa prompted, still beaming at him. "Nick?"

He swallowed. Twice, just to make sure that when he opened his mouth, it would only be words that came out.

"Aunt Marie." he tried. Oh, he tried_ so hard_ to keep the trembling quaver out of his voice. "You're in town."

He might have intended it as a question. He was pretty sure it hadn't come out as one.

Mr. Garrett's face fell slightly. Disappointment and confusion darted through his expression, and Nick hastily redoubled his efforts to appear as though nothing was wrong.

So long as none of the three of them had any idea what was sitting at the table with them, his aunt would have no reason to bring them into it.

"It's good to see you again!" he forced out, stretching a wide smile across his lips. "How have you been? Wow, you look fantastic!"

His aunt stood, her smile mirroring his own as she pulled him into a hug.

Every cell in his body felt like _electricity_ had just surged through them.

The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. His pulse surged as adrenaline lit up his system like a holiday tree.

"Oh, thank you, Nicky." her voice was light and airy, nothing like how he remembered her ever speaking to him at all. "Time flies when you're seeing the world- and nothing like a little exercise to keep you fit and young. Wouldn't you agree?"

"I wouldn't really know." Nick brushed it off, trying to focus on the conversation through the contact high of the hug. It was starting to make him dizzy.

Marie pulled away at last. Held him at arm's length as if looking him over.

"Oh really?" there was something a lot more brittle in her voice now. "I'm surprised, Nick. Last I heard, you were going to get out and travel."

A spike of annoyance drove through the dizziness, cutting through it like suddenly seeing through a tear in a veil. Grounding him. Supporting him.

It was harder. So much harder than fighting off any other fit like this he'd ever had. Worse than when Wu slung an arm around his shoulders, worse than when Hank was playfully getting in his face, worse than when he had to chase and take down a suspect. Worse than any other time he'd had to restrain himself.

He wanted to just let go. To let go and drift and allow himself to fade, to fall into that dizziness, into the buzz of his aunt's company, her presence, her _dominance._

She was trying to make him surrender. And he was losing.

But that single spike of frustration crept into his mind.

What was at first just a little spark of emotion, when he focused on it, flared with every passing thought. Every memory of everything his aunt had ever done that he resented her for.

Every callous word about his hopes and dreams, every careless injury in training that she'd told him to suck it up and walk it off, every night he'd woken up with a nightmare and she'd told him not to be so weak. His indignation when she'd abandoned him on his eighteenth birthday. His fury with her now, for coming to a place like the bakery- somewhere so perfectly light- and thinking to manhandle him here, right in the heart of the place he felt safest.

It almost wasn't enough. Digging up every ounce of emotion, it still almost wasn't enough. The pressure weighing down on him, trying to smother him, was so heavy. So much stronger than he was. So much darker.

But then...

Then, as a last ditch effort, he went deep. All the way down, all the way back to the very beginning.

He went back to the day he'd run away from dinner. To the day when he'd gotten sick of the lies, and asked what the Reaper's scythe meant for the first time, and she had torn up his picture.

He went back, and remembered that feeling he'd had that day. That feeling which had made him want to tear every page out of every book she ever read, to burn everything she ever owned, to take everything she had ever considered to be worthwhile in the world and break it all, all of it, every work of art she ever thought beautiful and every book she ever found meaning in and every place she ever loved to visit and every piece of music she ever considered listening to more than once and every person she ever loved and burn them all to the ground, _every single last one of them_-

It was tiny. Almost unnoticeable.

But the second he mentally shoved the haze away from him, his aunt _flinched_.

It was even harder to compose himself. To drag himself back up from that abyss, to pull himself back from that ledge. He'd given himself enough fuel that the fire inside of him wanted to burn until it had consumed every last scrap of his anger. But this wasn't a time for rage and careless action. He wasn't some headstrong little brat.

His urges and instincts didn't control him like a puppet. They never had, and he wasn't going to let them start now.

"Yeah, well," he had no idea how he'd managed to keep his voice so calm and collected. He was practically shaking. What was it she'd asked him? -oh, about traveling after she left him, right. "It didn't wind up happening. I might have lost my scholarship opportunity if I took a year off."

"Your scholarship." her hands had pulled away from him. Drifted down to her sides. He hadn't missed that they were trembling, too. "Straight through school, hmm? That's the Nick I remember. Always so dutiful. So responsible." she paused, then- "And after that?"

"The road brought me here." Nick stated. Every second, he was managing to pull himself together more and more. "It's a really lovely place, Portland, and I'm lucky to have a place here. Some wonderful people who've been very kind to me. I see you've already met some of them."

"But you didn't go out." his aunt completely ignored his attempt to point out that he was happy here. "You never saw the pyramids of Egypt, or the palaces of China, or the temples of the Mayans?"

"No, I didn't." he admitted. She was staring at him with such- such dismay on her face.

"Oh, Nicky." she shook her head. "That was your dream, wasn't it?"

_Since when,_ he wanted to ask, _was that my dream? Since when was that anything but what you wanted for me, since when did I ever tell you I wanted to travel the world? Did you ever listen even once to my real_ _dreams?_

"I suppose I'll just have to be content with the amazing life I have here." it might have just been him, but he got the feeling that the smile on his face was a bit sour. "In this incredible town where I feel at home and at peace."

"Settling down? Nick..." she winced- she actually winced! "If there's something keeping you here, tying you to this place, is it really worth more than your happiness?"

His _happiness?_

He took a deep breath. His emotions were still tinged by putting his anger on a leash and using it like a tool, that had to be it. That had to be why every word out of her mouth was so grating.

"I am happy here." he explained. His patience was wearing thin, but he managed to still stay polite. "I've got a home, and good friends, and the job I've always wanted-"

Maybe being rude would have been better.

With how she reacted, he might as well have slapped her.

"You _what?_" she whispered, staring at him as though he had just told her he had contracted leprosy.

Nick took a deep breath. Awkwardly keeping in mind that there were other people in the room.

"Aunt Marie," he began, "Maybe if you want to come up to my apartment- we can sit and have a cup of tea and talk-"

"You actually did it?" she was staring at him with horror in her eyes. "You joined those incompetent hogs? Despite every time I forbade you, despite all I ever did to show you that you had more potential in your left pinkie than those fools did in their whole blundering squad-"

"Aunt Marie, please-" he tried to interrupt, but she had straightened up, her teeth gritted.

And the next words she said drove the wind out of him.

"Nick, it's _time_." she insisted, stressing the word meaningfully. "It's _time_ for you to go and quit that job,_ right now_. This _can't _wait until tomorrow. You drive back there and tell them it's done, you're _gone_, and you do it_ now_."

Nick stared at her, the last of his anger fleeing before the rush of ice that had surged through his veins.

It was _time?_

Now? _Right now?_ His time was up?

This was it?

No... no, that- that couldn't be right. It couldn't be.

He'd just made friends with Wu. Just bought his new house. It hadn't even been half a year since his promotion.

It couldn't be now. It just- couldn't be.

He had wanted just a little while longer. He had wanted to know how it felt to be more than the rookie, to make his division proud. He hadn't done enough good in the world yet.

His time couldn't be up.

Calyssa had stood up. She was looking between him and his aunt, realization blossoming across her face followed by stubborn determination. He barely heard what she was saying to his aunt, but something of it still pierced through the fog.

"-going to have to ask you to leave, ma'am."

"I'm not going anywhere without my nephew."

"Ma'am, this is a business, and it is after closing time. We're well within our right to ask you to leave."

"Then Nick is coming with me."

"Mr. Burkhardt is a resident here."

Nick felt numb. Every inch of him just seemed to have forgotten what it was supposed to be doing, what it was supposed to be feeling.

But that reminder- that single reminder of Calyssa's kindness, even though the two of them weren't on the best of terms, even though they'd had a bit of an uncomfortable and awkward run of it- was enough to make him realize.

His aunt had just said it _couldn't wait until tomorrow_.

With meant that his Becoming was happening_ tonight_.

A Grimm being born under _this_ roof, so close to these three bright and kind souls- a Grimm, his Grimm, tearing them apart-

"I'll go."

The words had slipped from his lips before he could think of some excuse. All he knew was that he had to get out of here. He had to get away from this place- as far away as possible, as fast as possible.

"Nick!" Mrs. Garrett was calling out from behind him- "Nick, you don't have to-"

"I'm sorry." he apologized. Sorry for thinking he could do this, he could stay here- him- a Grimm- in close proximity to people like them, _good people_. Sorry for thinking he might be able to absorb some of their light and it would do anything more than momentarily abate his darkness. Sorry for putting them at risk just so he could indulge himself by pretending to be normal. "I need to go. Goodbye."

He ran.

x

He was six blocks away when his aunt finally caught up with him.

"Where are you going?" she asked, faintly. "Nick, this isn't something that should be done out in the open. You're going to be weak, vulnerable. Your apartment would be much better than-"

"I have a house." he stated, quickly. "It's more private."

"And you didn't think to take your car because...?" she wondered.

"I need to- move. To think." that really was the best excuse he could think up. "Isn't there some way to- delay it? Just another year. Just a few more months?"

"Nick..." his aunt was keeping pace with him, watching him sadly. Finally, she hesitantly shook her head. "You've already put it off to an almost inexcusable point. I'm sorry- I'm so sorry I'm late- I got caught up on business in Croatia- but I thought I was going to get here too late. I thought you would already have risen through your Becoming by the time I got here."

"Well I haven't." despite all evidence to the contrary- the headaches, the pressure, the change in how he saw things, the sudden homicidal urges-

"You haven't." she agreed, softly. "Oh Nick. This must have been so hard on you, I can't believe... if I could have come sooner, I would have. Please, believe that."

Nick hesitated. Then, he nodded, looking down at his feet as he walked.

"I believe you." he mumbled.

A hand landed on his shoulder.

When he looked up at her, she was watching him tentatively.

"You really do?" she wondered. "I... thought you hated me."

What?

"Why would I hate you?" he was legitimately confused. "You're my aunt, you raised me, took care of me."

"If you didn't, why did you reject the bond?" she sounded so sad. Nick couldn't have been more lost, and his nervous agitation wasn't helping.

"What bond?"

"The- Grimm inside of you." she averted her eyes. "It saw the Grimm inside of me as- I've never felt that before. I never... for a second, you reacted to me like I was your mother. Your _real_ mother. But before the bond could connect, and cement itself, it- you snapped it. By hand."

_...oh._

Nick's stomach lurched as he ground to a halt. He stared at her for a long moment before managing to force a watery smile onto his lips.

"That was a bond?" he whispered. "I thought you were trying to force me to-"

To _what?_

To stop thinking, was that it? To attack his friends? To hurt someone?

What was it she'd nearly forced him to do, which had made him panic so badly?

"To...?" she was watching him, watching his eyes carefully, waiting.

He finally found the right word for it, beginning to walk towards his new house again. His legs were long enough that his aunt nearly had to jog to keep up, but she didn't seem phased.

"To surrender."

Her eyebrows shot up.

"Nicky-" she began, hesitantly. "Why would you use a word like that? You make it sound like I was attacking you."

He realized belatedly that he should have really thought through his next words before letting them escape his lips.

"You showed up out of the blue after I haven't seen you in years, after the way we parted was- not what I would have chosen. I come to one of the few places where I feel safe to find you playing friendly with some of the only people I really, truly care about, and then I felt this- _overwhelming_ pressure to submit. To give in. I didn't think you were being friendly. I thought you were _threatening_ me."

His aunt jerked away from him like he had burned her. But there was the pressure- the wound- the pain inside of him- he had caused his soul an actual injury by tearing himself away from her so viciously, he realized. Had he caused her one, as well?

He took a deep breath. Steeled himself. There was pressure- he wanted to scream at her, to offload on her, to insist that she wasn't allowed to just swoop in after abandoning him and then expect him to still treat her like he would his mother- for her to insist that he had failed in his dreams when he had done everything he wanted to and more- to deride his job when he had worked so hard to get to where he was and do as much good as he had-

It wouldn't help. None of it would help. Not one bit of it.

"I've restrained it thus far." he insisted, finally managing to drag himself back on topic. "I can keep restraining it. I'm strong enough. I won't give in."

"Nick..." Marie was watching him, and for the first time in his life, there was undisguised grief on her face. She was looking at him the same way that someone side-eye appraised someone they thought might have some kind of mental illness. "No, I'm sorry, Nick- that's not how it works. It's going to happen. It'll happen tonight. Neither of us have any say in the matter."

"Then if I can't stop it, tell me how to control it!" he was in no kind of mood to be getting these kind of condolences from her.

"You'll learn." she promised, grabbing his hand. "I swear to you, I will teach you, Nicky. You'll learn. It's going to be okay."

It took him a long moment to collect himself. Regain his composure. They were nearing his house.

And then what? What, after he learned? What would she expect of him? How would he be changed?

Would he even be _capable_ of being a detective anymore, after he'd undergone his Becoming? Would he even _want_ to be?

"Nearly there." he muttered, quietly.

"Good." His aunt nodded. And then- "We'll need your handcuffs."

x

Less than an hour ago, Nick remembered. Less than an hour ago, the biggest problem on his plate had been trying to figure out a way to direct an investigation towards realizing a Blutbad had committed the crimes.

Less than an hour ago, he'd been looking forward to seeing Hank and Wu again tomorrow.

It was funny, how fondly he could look back at less than an hour ago as if it was a whole other lifetime.

The house that had always felt comfortable and spacious to him now felt hollow and ominous. The lack of furniture made him feel as if he was trespassing, even though he had been here a dozen times.

His aunt had taken him down to the basement and cuffed his wrists behind his back to a heavy pipe that stuck out of the wall. He was in jeans and a t-shirt. She'd warned him only that this process tended to be messy, and he shouldn't wear anything he didn't want to burn tomorrow.

And now, they sat. And waited.

He felt a bit like a werewolf. Chained up, waiting for the moon to change him. It wasn't the moon, his aunt had explained, but a convergence of forces that were calculated based on the day, hour, and minute of birth of the Grimm child, which stars looked over them in the night sky, how the planets aligned, where they had been born and where they were presently residing-

He'd nodded along, pretending to be interested.

His life as he knew it was about to come to an end. His world was about to fall apart. Everything he'd worked for was about to collapse around him.

He really wasn't that focused on astrology at the moment.

But there they were now. She was standing, he was kneeling, waiting for... whatever it was to happen. There they were, waiting for him to become someone else. _Something_ else.

His heart still ached from where he'd burned himself with vindictive fury in order to burn her, too. He still resented her, but he had managed to reconcile with it being irrational, at last.

In another hour, this moment might feel like another life, as well. He might look back on it and regret his choices.

He didn't want to regret anything. Not right before what might be the end.

"Aunt Marie?" he spoke up, softly.

"Hmm?" she looked up at him, stony faced and solemn.

He hesitated. Embarrassment warred with the uncomfortable feeling of being alone, even as his headache throbbed behind his eyes.

He'd been alone. For so long, he'd felt so alone. When he was very small, when they lived off the grid, when he was going through high school, when nobody at the station could remember his name...

He'd gotten spoiled. Spoiled for people who knew him, lately. Who knew enough about him for him to call them friends.

The idea of going back to being alone again, of having all of that torn away- it was the worst feeling in the world.

In less than an hour, he might have lost it all. Every one of those people might become his enemy. Or his prey. No longer capable of relating to him and his alien thoughts and feelings.

But there was someone right in front of him who could.

"The bond." he stopped. Licked his lips. Took a deep breath. "If... now that I actually know what it is. Would you still be willing? Even after I burned you?"

At her silence, he cursed himself for getting his hopes up. For putting her on the spot like that.

"Or not." he hastened to add. "If... if you don't think- it's fine. If you don't think we have enough time, or- if it would be too much."

There was a small noise, and he finally looked up.

She was standing there, a broken smile stretched from ear to ear. There were unshed tears in her eyes.

Marie walked forward. Knelt in front of him.

"Oh, Nicky." she whispered, drawing him into a hug, careful not to put too much strain on his arms trapped behind his back.

At the touch of contact, that feeling lit up again. Hesitant, wary after already being broken once.

This time, though, he opened himself up. Instead of fighting it off, or pulling away, or lashing out, he just let himself fall.

And he fell.

It was as though a warm blanket had been wrapped around his shoulders. Around his heart.

Acceptance. Protection. _Safety_.

That was it. That was the feeling he had been missing.

_Feeling safe._

He had overreacted. She might be pushy, but she really did try to make sure she did the best for him. She had never really gotten how much his dream meant to him, yeah- to her, being a _Grimm_ was work. She had wanted him to travel, to relax and have fun before he needed to shoulder that cruel burden. The fact that he hadn't had only made her disappointed because she felt like it was the same as being denied a childhood.

He didn't know how he knew that, but he did. And when she finally pulled away from the hug, and he met her eyes, he knew that she had understood his reasons with the same sort of intimate acceptance.

He knew because she was crying for him.

He managed a pained smile. Leaned forward, pressing their foreheads together.

"Oh, my precious little boy." she whispered, her voice strained. "All this time?"

All this time? All this time _what?_

_All this time, he had been trying so hard to do good because he felt like he was evil?_

"Since before I can remember." he replied, softly.

She shook her head in despair, opening her mouth to rebuke him, to reassure him.

The pain within his head _exploded_.

His back arched. He would have screamed if he'd even been capable of drawing in the breath he would have needed.

And the world went _white_.


	13. Greet the Beast

Nick goes pretty psycho in this chapter. If chapter 8 made you uncomfortable, this one definitely will as well. All due warnings.

Also, to all of my readers, you are wonderful and I love you all, whether you leave a review or not. Thanks for sticking with me and I hope you continue to enjoy this story!

* * *

There was nothing in the world that could have prepared him for this.

If it had been just pain, just torture, at least that he could have something to relate it to.

This wasn't pain.

It was _madness._

It felt like being trapped in a taffy puller. Like being stretched out until too much of him was spread too thin and then being recombined _wrong_, connecting him in different places and in different ways than he should have been connected. _Over_ and _over_ and _over_ again.

It felt like dying. Endlessly dying, and coming back to life, only to die all over again.

It felt like begging. Praying. Pleading for mercy, for it to _stop_.

It felt like _breaking_.

There was no withstanding this. There was no standing up to it, no standing against it.

It felt like for just a moment, for just a split second, he knew _everything_. He knew every answer, every solution, to every problem in the world.

But with every death, with every long suffering stretch of what made him who he was, he forgot something. Something important. With every death, something inside of him was buried. Until he had lost all those answers, and all the whispers, and all the ghosts wrapped up inside of him. Until there was nothing left.

It must have been happening for a hundred years. That was what it felt like.

But when he remembered that he had flesh, that this ghost which was him rode in a skeleton that had muscle and sinew and skin, he hadn't yet forgotten that he had eyes.

Which meant that he had eyelids.

He opened his eyes.

The world was pulsing. Pulsing like a heartbeat from all around him, those Will O'Wisps behind his eyes lit up as though they glowed. Stars at pitch black midnight, so close he could touch them. That he could taste them.

The darkness stared back at him. Mother had stayed. She had stayed with him, and waited, and been patient even though he had been a fool.

He wasn't a fool, now.

Little child, that was all he was. Nothing more than a stupid, silly newborn that scrambled to grab onto anything within arm's reach and not let go.

But mother still loved him. Still wanted to teach him. To love him and hunt with him and feed him and care for him.

There it was. Staring back at him.

The mother in the shadows.

And this place- his arms-

His hands. His wrists.

They hurt. They ached. They burned.

Even as he pulled at them, a shudder of pain shot through them, and he stopped almost instantly.

Mother had come to his side. Standing so close to him.

Speaking. Words.

'_Trial_', that was one word that got through. That registered to his ears. And then '_Conflicted_', followed by '_gets easier_'.

He just stared up at her. Whatever she said had to be right. She knew best.

There was that pulsing again. Harder. Louder. Faster.

Was it coming from him?

He needed to blink, he realized. Needed to breathe.

He'd been just kneeling there. Still and silent as a gargoyle.

When he tried to stand, his wrists jerked him to a halt, and sweet kind wonderful protective _beautiful_ mother went silent.

He worried. What had he done? What had he said? He didn't mean to make her fret.

His body was buzzing. Like his connection between his mind and his flesh had been cut. The signal was coming up static.

His body.

The moment his mind turned to it, the thought of flesh came up. That thought burrowed into his mind and carved him open and hollowed him out and made him plead and beg and focus on it with every ounce of his attention.

Flesh.

Flesh splitting. Cut.

Rising in black and blue and green and yellow. Bruised.

Flesh, filled with muscles which could be severed and pulled and snapped.

Muscles, supporting bones which could be broken and carved out and cracked.

And inside- inside him, inside everyone, inside the bones, was that most tender marrow. Like a bloody sponge within that hard shell.

He had never sunk his teeth into it before. But he wanted to now.

He wanted to run, and keep running, and never stop.

He wanted to break those bones and hear the screams and feel the blood on his fingers as he sunk his teeth into that deceptively soft mess of soft tissue and hard bone and rich marrow.

He wanted to see the tears in panicked eyes. To see the fear on pale, stretched faces. The despair, etched into helpless flesh as if by an artist. The pain, painted into being with grasping, patient, searching fingers.

His fingers.

Just like sketching, his mind offered. Looking at a face and painting it with wretchedness to make it more beautiful.

Because that was what it was. Beautiful.

Every cell in his body sang at the thought. At the image.

Wretchedness.

The begging and pleading and crying and suffering and screaming-

A shiver traveled down his spine. It shuddered through his veins like electric euphoria.

The thrill surged through his blood. Every ounce of him was made of joy and relief and _indulgence_.

He had suffered for far too long. Suffered without allowing himself that purest, truest bliss.

Denied himself that fantasy of cutting into flesh and watching that skin twitch and the eyes contained within roll back into its head and choke on the pain- denied himself that most important, most significant murder-

He had suffered without it all this time. Without that pleasure.

But no longer.

"Please." the word that slipped from his lips was the first one that he considered to be worthy of saying. Mother had the keys to his chains. To his shackles.

She could release him.

"Please." he repeated. The hair on the back of his neck was standing on end. He couldn't wait- couldn't wait to finally let go, to hunt, to kill- "Please."

He wanted to find someone and cut them apart and leave the slices of skin as calling cards.

He wanted to take someone and carve them up and cook them and serve them to an audience.

He wanted to hunt. To take. To keep. To never let go.

To drive nails into their joints and the spaces between their bones.

To shave off all their skin until he could see every string of muscle that was pulled to make the puppets move.

To crush knees and elbows and leave them helpless.

To pour searing acid across their hands and feet until they couldn't so much as walk.

So long as they were helpless, they couldn't leave him.

So long as they were helpless, they couldn't escape.

He could keep them. Do whatever he wanted with them.

_Anything._

His own words echoed in his ears as he pleaded aloud. The sounds ringing through his bones.

"Please, please, please-"

When he looked up at his- beautiful wonderful glorious mother of blood- he couldn't quite figure out why she was staring at him like that.

So sadly. With such regret on her face.

"What's wrong?" he didn't want to see her so sad. He wanted to make her happy. To show her peace and joy. Why was she looking at him like he was causing her sorrow? "What did I do wrong?"

She was silent. Just watching him. She wasn't telling him the answer. Was it a lesson, maybe? To teach him to figure it out for himself?

He thought back. Considered it. Delved deep within himself for what she could possibly have wanted.

"Is it because I was so mean?" he finally asked. "Mean to you? I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to. I love you. I'll show you- I'll show you I love you. I'll bring you a present. I'll..."

He trailed off. He would bring her something. Something to show her how much he wanted to make her happy.

Some_one_.

"What do you want?" he asked, quietly. "Who do you want? I'll bring them back. You can take them. They can be yours. I won't ever disobey you again. Please, just don't be so sad. I won't..."

But she was staring at him now as if it was taking everything she had not to look away. He was watching her. Confused.

He had been so bad before. Now that he knew he should be obedient, should never speak up against her, why did she look so disappointed?

"What's wrong?" he asked, again. "Why are you so sad? Please, tell me. Whatever it it, I'll make it go away. I promise."

But she still just stood there. Silently watching.

He wanted to wait for her. To wait for her to tell him what it was that she wanted. But he had so much energy. So much.

His hands were twitching. His shoulders were shaking. He just wanted to- to move. That was all.

He needed to do something.

Mother was patient. She had so much more patience than him.

His stomach lurched with fear and horror. Was she going to _leave_ him like this? Chained up, locked up? Was she going to leave him restrained until he went _mad?_

He had to do something. He had to get this- this restless energy out. If he didn't, then-

He would have rather been dead. Rather that fate, than not being able to do anything.

"Please." he was begging, really properly begging now. "Please- mother please let me go. Why do you have me chained like this? When I just want to make you happy...?"

She wouldn't even meet his eye.

Why? Why?

"Mother?" he whispered. Had he disappointed her so badly before that she wouldn't so much as look at him? Was that it? "Mother, please. Please tell me-"

"You have to kill." She interrupted him.

He stopped. Stared at her.

"By the end of the night." she continued. "That's what's important. It cements your Becoming. Before the end of this night, you need to have taste blood, to kill someone. If you don't, then those urges of yours will never cease nor ease. They'll just keep pushing you until you lose your mind."

"Alright." he agreed. She wanted him to- indulge? Just like he wanted to? Would that make her happy? "Just point me. Show me who. Show me how."

She turned her back on him. Still, she wouldn't even meet his eyes.

"You promised." he remembered, vaguely. "You promised you would teach me. Please."

He would do anything she wanted him to do.

Cut of their heads, strangle them, stab them, carve out their hearts and eat them. Anything.

So why was she so disappointed with him?

_Oh God._

He blinked. Focused through the faint distraction that had almost pulled him away.

When he looked back up at her, she was watching him with those sad, distraught eyes.

"I'm going to set you loose, now." she assured him, softly. "Now that you finally won't hurt yourself. Just promise me you'll come back once you've had your fill."

Swearing that oath was the easiest thing he'd ever done in his life.

The dark beautiful glorious fire mother looked over him with a watchful eye before nodding.

"Good. Then I have something for you."

x

The _something_ turned out to be a beautiful, ornately carved porcelain mask.

It was cool and smooth against Nick's face. Solid, pure white- with intricate designs on the outside that reminded him of a skull.

He was grinning beneath that toothy smile of his mask. Grinning as he ran and danced and his heart sang.

He was released. _Unleashed_.

Wearing a face his mother made to be more beautiful than his skin.

Playing the game that ran in his blood.

It was time to finally satisfy that _hunger_ within him.

x

Nick ran. He ran and danced and sang across the rooftops. That song of blood, that cry of ruthless joy, of berserker instinct demanding satisfaction.

He had to find someone. Someone to kill.

He would take them and knock them out and drag them back. Strap them down and make them watch as he brought a knife to each joint in every finger, and then every toe. Before he slipped that blade beneath the flesh and severed the connective tissue, make them watch and listen to them beg as he skinned them alive.

All but the neck. All but the head.

He wanted to _watch_.

To watch their face as they wept, as he burned them, as he hooked them up to the wiring and fed electricity through them.

To listen to their screams as they lost control. As they devolved into a sobbing, gibbering wreck.

Every time they begged him to kill them, he would amputate another joint.

_Sick. Twisted._

He closed his eyes. His breath was coming out in ragged gasps as he stumbled through the streets, his head ducked down low, brushing his fingertips against the edge of the mask that his beautiful wonderful mother had gifted to him in good faith.

He would amputate another joint, starting at the hands and feet, moving up. Up to the wrists and ankles, then to elbows and knees, until he'd finally hit shoulders and hips.

Until there was nothing left for them to struggle with. Until all they could do was suffer, and feel, and beg, and be at his mercy.

He would carve them open and flay them alive. Only once they'd stopped begging for their life- stopped even so much as begging for death- would he finally wrap his hands around their throat and feel the air cut short- the blood pumping beneath his hands- watch the life drain out from beneath his fingertips-

_This is wrong._

Nick winced. Lifted a hand up to the back of his neck, trembling.

He had to. Had to,_ had to, **had**** to.**_

_Not good._

So what if it wasn't good? It would make mother proud. So proud she never needed to look at him with those sad, desperate eyes ever again-

_Stop._

Nick ignored that thought.

All he needed. All he needed was a victim. All he needed was someone to hunt. To make into his first masterpiece, his first toy-

There was the sound of shattering glass from somewhere to his left.

_Yes._

_No._

He had someone. Someone who was out late, who he could hunt, who wouldn't be missed. Not easily. Not soon.

It was so easy. So easy to pull himself up the outside of the building to that broken window- to snap off shards of glass until the hole was big enough to fit him without any gouging shards digging into his flesh. Until he finally had eyes on the monster he was going to gut, to fillet tonight in honor of his beloved mother.

It was ugly, and scaly, and huddled over an open flame that had been kindled in a trash can. _Fire_, his mind offered. _Burning alive._

Now_ that_ was suffering.

_Kill him._

He moved closer. Every footstep was calculated, deliberate. Silent.

_Right now. Do it. Kill him._

It was effortless. Moving closer and closer. Creeping up behind the drifter, his footsteps even fainter than the crackling of the flame-

When he was within arm's length, he reached out and wrapped his arm around the monster's throat and squeezed.

The fight wasn't easy. The drifter may not have been healthy, but he was strong. The first thing he did was to kick over the flaming trash can, scattering burning detritus everywhere. The heat pricked at Nick's eyes, but he didn't let go, no matter how harshly the monster struggled.

_Kill, kill, kill-_

_Kill Him._

Nick squeezed. Pressed down until he felt the struggles fall still, until those grasping hands that had been scrabbling at his wrist fell down to the drifter's sides.

Nick finally let him go when he knew that the monster was unconscious.

_Kill him._

He had a knife in his pocket. When had he brought that?

_Carve him open._

He absentmindedly flipped open the latch of the blade, ignoring the fire that was beginning to flicker out around him as it burned down the last of its fuel.

His eyes lifted from the knife and laid on the face of the-

**_No._**

**_No._**

**_No._**

**_No._**

There he was. Staring down at that face. That face.

That familiar face of a familiar stranger.

_That wasn't someone in a gang. That was someone who needed a warm blanket and a safe place to stay the night before a scuffle in a back alley somewhere got the better of him and he was left behind to bleed out._

Something inside of Nick _fractured._

_Surged._

_Rebelled._

Every cell in his body _rejected_ what his mind had prompted him to do.

Nick shoved himself away. Pushed himself off of the bruised and battered and unconscious addict, stumbling away. Every step was harder than the last.

_Kill him kill him kill him,_ his instincts urged.

_Rip out his throat and crush his eyes._

_Carve out every organ and leave him a hollow shell. A beautiful, withered husk._

For just a second, he slipped, one foot stopping and the other one trying to drag him back towards the still figure.

The force of will it took to drag himself away was _indescribable_. It was harder than anything he'd ever done before. Anything he'd ever done in his whole _life_.

But he did it.

He finally pulled himself away. Forced himself back out the open front door.

One foot.

In front of the other.

_One step._

_At a time._

As soon as Nick managed to push himself out the door, as soon as he stumbled out into the alley outside the building, he collapsed to his hands and knees. He grabbed the mask and tore it from his face just in time as his churning stomach rejected his most recent meal.

Nick was shaking. Right down to the bone.

The urges beat down on him as if they were the voice of his own heart, growing louder and louder with every pulsing throb.

The force of will that it took was immense. The strain it put on him nearly unbearable.

But as he slowly forced himself to his feet, and stumbled out into the street. The mask hung from his hand at his side, limp and lifeless. When he looked at it now, the ornate skull-like carvings on it, all it made him feel was sick.

The only relief was that it was late enough that nobody was really out on the streets. His clothes had been chosen from mother's encouragement to wear something he wouldn't miss if he had to burn it.

She hadn't mentioned that he would be heading out into the world, or else he might have grabbed a coat or something. He was freezing.

_You deserve it,_ his mind supplied, even as he shivered._ For what you did. For what you were going to do._

Maybe it would be more merciful if he just froze to death right out here in the open. His life was over anyhow- it wasn't like he was going to be able to go back to how things were before. And if he died before he got the chance to hurt anyone, then-

"Nick."

His feet stopped mid-step.

Every hair on his body was prickling, standing on end.

Something inside of him swelled with joy even as he turned back to face-

_Mother._

She was standing there, all shawls and draped, patterned cloth. She had his coat draped over her arm.

Nick looked away. He couldn't meet her eyes.

"Go away." his body was shaking- he couldn't tell if it was from the cold or the adrenaline rush finally leaving his veins.

"Nick..." she took a step forward- something inside of him sat up to attention and wagged its tail like an obedient dog- and Nick flinched away from her.

"Leave me alone!" he demanded, stumbling back.

There was a silence. Then, she sighed quietly.

"I see." she whispered. Gently, she set down his coat, then moved back a few steps. "Nick, please. It's freezing out."

The noise that swelled up in his throat was barely above a choked sob.

"I know." he forced out.

"Won't you please take your coat?"

He wanted to scream at her. To lash out and rage and- and tell her how he deserved to freeze out here.

But abruptly, every ounce of that sadistic driving force in his mind changed its tune. It stopped screaming at him to _run hurt kill_ and snapped at him for even considering doing something so rude to his beloved mother when she'd gone to all of the trouble of bringing him his coat.

His feet had moved towards it before he could stop himself. Kneeling down in front of her like he was _bowing_ to her just to pick up the hoodie.

When he shrugged it on, something metallic clacked together inside the front pocket.

Nick hesitated. He wanted to look up, to ask, but he couldn't bring himself to meet mother's eye.

Instead, he reached into the pocket.

His hand brushed against a familiar ridge of metal. He knew what it was long before he ever pulled it out to stare at it.

His police badge.

She'd brought him his gun and police badge.

"Come on, Nicky." her gentle voice rang in the silence, in his ears, like it was the only noise in the whole world. "I know it's late, but someone should still be working at the station. We can go turn them in right now. Together."

His eyes traced the words on his badge. The star with the division's seal right in the center.

And his name.

He flipped it open. A picture of himself was staring back up at him. Smiling.

That picture had been taken just after he'd passed basic training in the academy. He'd been so pleased- so proud- of how far he'd made it. Excited by how close he was to achieving his dream.

The mask was in his other hand.

He lifted it up to stare at it. That cold, blank porcelain skull.

Which one was him?

That rookie cop who hadn't yet realized he really wanted to be a detective? Who felt like he had his whole life ahead of him- like his Becoming day would never arrive, who was just starting to get to know the Garretts and hadn't even met Calyssa?

Or that cold, unfeeling mask? The person who'd struggled with his sight and his headaches and his homicidal urges? The person who had finally let go and surrendered to them?

Except...

Except, he _hadn't_.

Startled epiphany spread through him at that.

He _hadn't_ submitted to his urges. He had pulled himself away.

Nobody had died at his hands tonight.

A smile crept onto his lips. It wasn't the same smile that he recognized from his ID photograph, but it wasn't the rictus grin of the skull, either.

He slipped the badge onto his belt.

Pulled out his gun holster and hooked it onto his other hip.

Shoved the mask into his pocket.

When he finally, finally forced himself to look up, to meet mother's eyes-

_Disappointment. Anger. Betrayal._

For one lurching second, he wanted to fall to his knees and beg for her forgiveness. He wanted to drag the mask back out and force it onto his face and make her proud.

The force of will it took not to submit might have been one even greater than it had taken not to kill.

"This isn't me." he finally forced out the words, feeling every breath as though it was a punch to his gut. "This," he tapped the badge on his belt. "This is me."

"You can't go back to how things were before." she pointed out, flatly. "Or would you go back there and pretend to uphold the law now that you've broken it? Now that you have blood on your hands?"

Nick couldn't help it. When he drew in a deep breath, he started _to laugh _until his ribs hurt.

"What?" she demanded, raising her voice over his hysteria, her brows lowered together on her forehead. "What's so funny?"

"I haven't killed anyone!" he finally forced out. "I stopped myself. My hands- my hands are clean!"

"_What?_" she tensed, thunderstruck.

"It-" he sniffed. His nose was running. Maybe he really had caught a cold without the coat. "It took- everything I had- but I _stopped_."

"Nick?" She was staring at him in horror. "Oh no, _no_- Nick, what have you _done?_"

"I walked away." he insisted, grinning. His runny nose was really starting to get annoying- he was trying to have a pretty damn significant conversation here, and sniffling like a little kid wasn't the most dignified way to have it.

He reached up to wipe his nose on the back of his hand.

The second it left behind a smear of red, he realized belatedly that something was_ very_ wrong.

"No." his beloved mother whispered, staring at it with the same sort of dismay that most people reserved for when they'd been informed they were diagnosed with a terminal illness. "Oh no. No, Nick- you have to get out there, you have to do it- you have to hunt _right now_-"

"I won't!" his eyes snapped up from the blood and back to her. So his nose was bleeding and he felt a little loopy- so what?

"Didn't you hear me?" her teeth were actually bared as she spoke. "You have to kill- you have to do it to complete your Becoming tonight, and soon- if you don't, then-"

"I'll just have to handle it." Nick brushed it off. "If I can control- this- then I'm not going to give in. Not now, not ever."

"I'm not talking about the instincts getting a little stronger!" she practically screamed at him. "I'm talking about losing yourself completely! There being nothing left of you- of your mind, of your memories- just this- this unstoppable gluttonous beast-!"

"I won't let that happen!" Nick snapped.

He didn't know what happened.

One second, she took a step towards him with something like fury in her expression.

And then, her eyes widened, and her mouth opened in a silent gasp. Her face contorted into a grimace of pain.

His lungs froze in his chest as he watched a spray of blood fly into the air.

For a single, split second, both him and the instincts just went blank in shock.

It was the noise of her knees hitting the pavement that snapped him back to reality. A reflection of light nearly blinded him, and Nick jerked back.

There was a man standing there. A stranger in a dark coat holding a long, slender scythe.

_Nick couldn't breathe._

Every nightmare he'd ever had since he was just a little boy came rushing back to him, flooding through him and sparking alight with _terror_.

_That scythe._

He scrambled back, a wordless cry tearing itself free from his throat.

_That was a Reaper._


	14. Hit the Ground

A shorter chapter this time, but I really wanted to get this scene out there. Once again, love you all!

* * *

There wasn't any time to think. Only to act.

Mother was bleeding out on the ground. Her eyes were wide and vacant, but Nick could still see the rise and fall of her chest.

He wasn't the only one.

The Reaper hoisted the scythe up high over his head, preparing to bring it down on mother's neck, and Nick _moved_.

His body surrendered to the aching plea in his chest- for the first time, both he and his instincts agreed on something.

_Stop him. Protect mother._

Nick _lunged._

The Reaper's attention was focused on mother, on the arc of the scythe, on the killing blow. When Nick collided with him, it might as well have been an ambush.

The Reaper went flying like he'd been hit with a wrecking ball. Something in the back of Nick's mind was stunned, shocked to silence- _how had he done that?_- but even as his awareness pulled back mid-lunge, recoiling away from his instincts, away from the fight, he overbalanced and went tumbling along with his opponent.

This was no time to be hesitant. The Reapers were born and raised to fight Grimms. To hunt them as prey.

If he held back, he was going to get himself murdered.

And indeed, before he could even get to his feet, one of the Reaper's fists came sailing towards his face. He just barely managed to dodge it by letting himself fall flat on his back.

"_Stop!_"

Nick flinched. He scrambled away, pulling at his gun so he could level it at the Reaper. Before he could get a bead, the scythe snapped out and jerked it from his hands, sending the piece flying.

The Reaper took a step back. To Nick's surprise, the scythe wasn't leveled at him in warning.

It was held out to the side. As if the Reaper was trying to tell him that they didn't want to-

"_What the hell do you think you're doing?_" the voice spoke from within the recesses of the Reaper's hood. "_Don't get in my way! Don't you know who that is?!_"

_Realization_ washed through Nick.

He had put away his mask.

He had put his mask into his pocket. The only visible identifying articles he was wearing were-

His badge and gun.

And blood streaming down his face.

The bottom dropped out from his stomach, even as his instincts cried out for blood.

Had the Reaper attacked mother- because he'd seen what was happening, seen their argument and-

_And thought that he was saving a cop from a Grimm?_

"Attacking her unprovoked-" he didn't even know how he was going to talk his way out of- "She wasn't going to hurt me, she's-"

"_The Charnel Queen_." the words which escaped from that hood were tense and dry. "_She's the Charnel Queen_."

Nick froze.

He'd always known. Always presumed, always thought- it had always been in the back of his mind, ever since he first realized what his family was, but-

All those times that he'd recognized, in the back of his mind, that she hunted- that she killed- it had never really registered to him.

But the Charnel Queen?

The serial killer who the news had deemed the most prolific mass murderer of the century?

The Charnel Queen, who impaled her victims on sharpened spikes while they were still alive? Who burned them as if at the stake?

That was- _mother?_

No, no his- his aunt? _That was his aunt?_

That was the woman who was laying less than ten feet away, bleeding out?

"No." the word slipped from his lips before he could stop it. More of a breath than a whisper.

The Reaper straightened up, and Nick got the feeling that a pitying stare had been fixed on him.

"_So you didn't know._" that distorted voice spoke once more. "_Responsible for hundreds of confirmed deaths over the last fifty years. If she is allowed to continue, the death toll will do nothing but rise. Step aside._"

"No." Nick forced out, the word spoken consciously this time. "No, she... if she really is- but I can't allow you to-"

"_You have your rules, as I have mine. I understand._" the Reaper nodded. "_Your rules state that she is to stand trial. Mine state that she cannot be allowed to leave this place alive. For her crimes, her skull shall rest in the ossuary of Ostergard._"

"I can't let you do that." Nick had never expected his voice to ever sound so strong when he was speaking to a Reaper.

"_I know._" was the patient reply. "_Your rules deny you from doing the right thing. __Which is why I will not give you a choice._"

One second, the scythe was out to the side.

The next, the Reaper whipped the butt end of it out, catching Nick on the temple.

He felt it connect with a_ crack_, falling to the ground in a burst of stars behind his eyes and a ringing in his ears.

His vision was swimming. Unconsciousness was just a single slip away.

_Move,_ his instincts screamed. _Move, move, move!_

Nick's hands twitched. Grasped at the ground as he tried to push himself back upright.

He couldn't do more than drag himself along.

_Mother is in danger,_ every single cell of his body was crying out that fact. _Mother is going to die!_

Nick's fingers brushed against something cold and smooth.

Through the bleary haze, he saw what it was.

It was his gun. Knocked clear from his grasp, fallen here by the wayside, forgotten.

His hand wrapped around it.

Pushing himself to his hands and knees nearly did him in. He was dizzy, the whispers demanding he_ kill_ had turned practically to screams, and if Nick's stomach hadn't been empty, he was certain he would have been too nauseous to even move.

Standing up? Not a chance.

But as he managed to force himself to his knees, to push back the insistent wave of blackness that wanted to drag him under, into unconsciousness, he knew what he had to do.

The Reaper was standing over mother again. Lifting the scythe to finish the job.

"Hey!" Nick called.

The Reaper hesitated. Glanced over his shoulder- Nick saw those eyes widen within the shadows of that hood.

"You get- away from her!" Nick insisted.

"_You won't shoot me._" the Reaper scoffed. "_You and I- we're on the same side._"

He turned back to Marie, muscles tensing to bring the blade down on her neck.

Nick pulled the trigger.

A bullet exploded from the tip of the barrel. Nearly two decades of being raised with a gun in his hands and at his hip left little to chance by way of his aim. The slug pierced through the side of that ominous, obscuring hood of the Reaper's, blood spraying out and painting a mist in the air.

The scythe fell to the ground. Inches away from mother's throat.

The Reaper crumpled to his knees. Collapsed to his side in a heap.

The gun fell from Nick's shaking hands.

For a second, it was silence. Complete and utter silence.

Then, it_ slammed_ into him.

It was like he'd been underground his whole life and only just seen the sun for the first time. It was like realizing he'd been standing on the edge of a cliff and finally jumping. The thrill of the wind whistling past his face, through his hair, the rush.

_Oh God, the rush._

Nothing else mattered. Nothing else but that rush. It was so good-_ so good, **so good-**_

Better than anything. He knew that without even needing to think about it. That feeling was the most obscenely wonderful thing he would ever experience in his whole life.

Better than sex, better than drugs, more important than food or water or air or gravity- no, it was his gravity, it was his air, it was what drove him, it was his world.

He could do anything.

It was the only thing that he could hold on to. Like everything else just detached, and fell away, and that rush was the only thing tying him to reality.

The pain in his head was gone. The dizziness was gone. He felt like he was floating.

He belonged this way. He could feel it. His whole life, he had felt left out, he had felt alienated, he had felt like he wasn't safe, he had felt like nowhere was really home.

This was home. This feeling. This was where he belonged.

This was the way things were supposed to-

A tiny gasp and a whimper pierced through the haze and stabbed into him as surely as a knife to his gut.

Nick scrambled forward. His jeans were ripped and his knees were bleeding and he was cold, but that didn't matter. None of it mattered.

Mother was staring up at him. Tears in her eyes.

Her mouth opened, but no sound came out.

"Mother," he whispered, panic beginning to set in, to overwhelm his calm. "Mother, it's going to be alright, he can't hurt you anymore, he's gone, he-"

She wasn't moving. When Nick turned to look over her injury-

He nearly dry heaved, right then and there.

He could see inside of her. Inside of the injury, past the blood.

He could see through the gap where her spine should have been connected. Through her back all the way inside of her to her lungs.

As he knelt there, he watched them shudderingly inflate with a pained breath. Fleshy, bloody sacks of air, as fragile as balloons, their paper thin surface only thing keeping her alive.

"No." he choked out. "No, no-"

What was he supposed to do? How was he supposed to- was he supposed to apply pressure to prevent her from bleeding out, or would that risk further damaging the spine? Would that stop her from breathing completely, would he just make it worse?

He didn't have a phone on him and he didn't dare move her to try and see if she had one-

Nick took a deep breath. As deep as his lungs would allow.

Then, he screamed.

"_Someone!_" the word tore itself from his vocal chords and split the silent night air with a breaking of tension that felt like breaking glass. "Anyone! _Help!_ Please, _help me!_"

Nobody replied. Nobody spoke.

But a light flickered on in a building nearby.

"Please!" his throat protested against the harsh treatment, already hoarse. He heard it distantly, still disconnected from the pain of it. He may well have screamed himself raw and not noticed it, with the blanket of numb pleasure that had descended over his senses. "Please, call nine one one! She needs an ambulance! _Please, hurry!_"

Something brushed against his hand.

Nick's breath caught in his throat. When he looked down, mother was staring up at him, tears in her eyes. Her thumb twitched again, gently tracing across the back of his knuckles.

She opened her mouth. Again, no sound escaped.

She was breathing. That, at least, was a mercy.

"What?" he choked out, leaning down, staring at her lips. "What are you trying to tell me, mother? What is it?"

Nothing. Instead, she managed the tiniest little watery smile.

Nick took her hand and squeezed it reassuringly. He could hear sirens start up far away in the distance.

"They're coming, mother." he whispered. "It's going to be okay. I'm right here. He won't hurt you again. Just stay with me, and they'll be here soon."

It took the ambulance less than three minutes to reach them.

By the time it did, she had stopped breathing.


	15. Cleaning Up the Pieces

You are all so wonderful and every time I open up this story and see how many people are enjoying it, I just wind up wanting to drop whatever I'm doing and write the next chapter.

* * *

"Nick?"

Nick wasn't really sure how he'd gotten to the hospital.

It felt like he was still kneeling there beside mother's body, unable to feel any of the pain he was in, watching her bleed out with her hand in his, trapped in a state of euphoric delight that wrenched him down to his core.

Mother had been dying. If he hadn't been so _high_, maybe he could have thought of a way to save her. Maybe he would have been able to come to some kind decision instead of just sitting there in shock and watching her bleed out.

"Nick, can you hear me?"

But now here he was. Sitting in a chair in the hospital, a blanket around his shoulders, staring at the washcloth in his hands. He had used it to wipe his face clean, he knew that, but he didn't actively remember using it.

He didn't actively remember the ride in the ambulance, either, or what the words were that the EMTs had used to command him away from mother.

His mind was still there with her. Lying there, bleeding out in the street. Like if he didn't let go, if he could just stay back there with her inside his head, she wouldn't be...

"Come on, man. Please?"

It had been his fault.

If he hadn't distracted her. If he had just been the son she deserved, they wouldn't have been arguing out there in the first place- if he hadn't distracted her, one of them would have noticed the Reaper's presence. If he had just been able to think straight-

He forced his mind away from that thought. He grasped for something, anything else to focus on.

Nick finally registered the hand on his shoulder.

He followed that hand down the arm all the way to the shoulder, then finally looked up into the face of the person it was attached to.

A familiar face stared back at him. Familiar eyes, filled with a pained sort of distress that he was far too used to seeing in them. That he usually tried so hard to try and take away.

Hank was sitting there at his side. Watching him. Waiting for him to respond.

"Nick?" he prompted, quietly. "You with us?"

The words _gouged_ into him. Stabbed through his heart as viciously as knives.

_No,_ he wanted to say. _No, he couldn't be._ He couldn't be here, with Hank, because that would mean he wasn't still there in the street with his mother.

He _couldn't._

"Come on, man." Hank's voice practically dragged him back to reality with a slap. "Say something. Anything."

The first words on his lips weren't ones that anyone wanted to her.

"It's my fault." he choked out.

Hank flinched away. Eyes wide.

"Nick-" he cut himself off, shaking his head. "Come on, man, you can't possibly think-"

"It was all my fault." He felt almost like he was on a ledge, on the verge of falling off a cliff, and he couldn't quite figure out which side gravity was pulling him towards. "I didn't- I couldn't-"

"Burkhardt." a quiet voice spoke up, and Nick's head snapped wasn't just him and Hank in the room. Wu was standing there with a grimace on his lips, but he wasn't the one standing in front of Nick, casting a warm shadow over him like it meant shelter from the storm.

Captain Renard was standing there, staring down at him.

"It wasn't your fault." his voice was powerful and commanding as he spoke- the words seemed to almost cut through the air as they slipped from his tongue. "There was no way you could have known the attacker would be there."

But _she_ could have.

Nick closed his eyes, his hands shakily lifting to his face.

_Mother_ could have. She could have stopped it. She could have defended herself.

If he just hadn't distracted her, if he had just moved a little bit faster...

Then maybe he could still be back there with her right now, in the street-

"Nick, stay with me, come on man-"

Once again, dragged back to the present with an almost physical lurch.

Nick shuddered. He was suddenly far too cold.

Pulling the blanket up further around him, he hesitantly reached up to the side of his head. There was a bandage just slightly above one eye, further towards his ear than his forehead.

When he touched it, the injury throbbed. But the pain grounded him- in its familiarity if nothing else- and brought his attention to a simple fact that he had overlooked until now.

_He didn't have a headache._

Nick could have almost laughed at that.

His life had been turned upside-down, he'd had his Becoming, he'd lost his mind, he'd gotten mother killed, and he'd shot a Reaper- but, on the plus side, _no more headache!_

He would have happily taken an axe to his own skull if it meant being able to get back how things were an hour ago.

They were speaking to him again. Trying to draw him back to reality.

"-going to need your statement." the Captain was pressing, trying to catch his eye. "Burkhardt?"

His mouth felt dry. Statement? On everything that had happened tonight?

"Come on, chief- he's still in shock." Wu finally stepped forward with a wince, trying to stand up for Nick. "It can wait until tomorrow, can't-?"

If they told him to wait that long, he knew he would obsess over details until it drove him completely mad.

Funny how you could still worry about going insane when you'd already proven you had lost your mind.

"I didn't even know she was in town."

Wu fell silent. All eyes in the desolate little hospital waiting room turned to him.

He was staring at his hands. At the washcloth draped across his fingertips, still covered in blood.

"She wanted to surprise me." he whispered. "But we- we didn't- see eye to eye. Not on a lot of things. We were- out walking around. Arguing. Fighting."

"What about?" Renard pressed, and Nick flinched.

He couldn't look up. Couldn't meet the man's eyes.

"She didn't like that I was a cop." he whispered. "She never did. She- mother- my aunt, I mean. She... she's old-school. She-"

Nick forced his eyes up, moving his head shakily until he was staring at the far wall.

It wasn't a completely unheard-of story. Plenty of parents out there were _old-school_. Less so with this more recent generation, but there were still more than enough children out there who could relate to seeing disappointment in their parents eyes when they denied their coming of age rituals.

"Raised me." he choked out. "With all the old traditions. When I- refused- to carry them on, she- we fought. We fought about it. Oh my God. We were- practically screaming at eachother in the middle of the street- and then this guy just comes out of nowhere-"

His breath caught in his throat. It felt like his adam's apple was trying to break free and strangle him.

"I didn't even see-" he choked out. It all felt too real- all of this, this dream, this nightmare he was trapped in. "I never even saw- not his face, but- he cut her down like she didn't even matter, and when I pulled my gun he hit me- oh my _God_, if I hadn't been yelling at her she would have noticed, she would have been able to tell that he was there- if I just hadn't distracted her she wouldn't have-"

"She should be out of surgery soon." Wu offered, hastily. "There's still a chance, man."

_What?_

Nick felt as if his knees had been knocked out from under him.

_What_ had Wu just said?

Surgery? She was in _surgery?_

Which meant she was still _alive?_

"I need to-" he pushed himself to his feet, leaning against the wall to keep his balance. "-need to see her, I need to tell her-"

The second he pushed away from the wall, dizziness overcame him and he nearly collapsed. Captain Renard grabbed him by the shoulder before he could fall and pushed him back into the chair.

"Okay, that's a no. You're not heading anywhere, Burkhardt." he reprimanded, brows drawn together in a frown. "You've lost a lot of blood, and your head's been cracked open. They wouldn't let you in to surgery anyways, not right now. _Rest._ When they have news, someone will come out and tell you."

Nick could barely see the Captain through his dizzy, swimming gaze, but he managed a shaky nod.

That was the perfect thing to top off tonight. His mother's life was in another person's hands, and he couldn't do a single thing about it.

Nick hurt. He hurt all over, in every way. He felt like one big mass of ache.

When he leaned back in his chair, Hank's hand on his shoulder offering reassuring warmth, it didn't take long for his eyes to close.

He dreamed of accusing eyes, and searing light, and bitter cold.

When he woke to the sound of a doctor calling his name, he almost wanted to go back to the nightmare.

x

He was allowed to sit with her.

So long as he was quiet, and didn't touch any of the machines, he could watch over her.

The adrenaline and the last of the killing high had all burned down. On the positive side, Nick's brain didn't feel like the tinder being used to light a supernova. On the negative one, though, he felt as though he had been scooped open and hollowed out, leaving only the husk of him remaining.

Some shy young man had brought him food and water. Nick had forced down the food, if only because he had to get his strength back if he was going to be of any use to mother.

_Of use._

His toes curled in his shoes. That was a thought that he had been trying his damnedest not to pay any mind to, but it just kept creeping into his mind. That thought that nagged at him, that made him cringe away.

That one, single thought that reminded him- for all he had fought to restrain his instincts, for all he had tried to stop himself, he had still wound up killing anyways.

Killing a _Reaper. _A real live Reaper, standing there with his scythe.

The only reason that Nick had been able to kill him had been because he'd gotten the drop on him. Surprised him.

The Reaper hadn't killed him only because he hadn't known who Nick was. _What_ Nick was. He had aimed to disable, instead of kill, because he had seen a _cop_ where he should have seen a _monster_.

And even when Nick had a gun pointed at him, that Reaper had faith that he wouldn't pull the trigger.

The fact that he had done it was something that dug into him.

His eyes glanced over mother's unconscious form. She looked so fragile like this. It didn't help that she barely looked older than he was now.

The beast inside of him saw the beast inside of her for what it really was, though. When he felt his instincts begin to stir, Nick tensed, but the rush of homicidal lust that he was expecting never came. All it did was make his heart _hurt._

_She was the Charnel Queen._

He'd read the stories on the hive. Watched the reports in the news.

How much of it was real and how much had been sensationalized, he wondered?

His aunt- his _mothe_r- the woman who had raised him and trained him and taken care of him- was the same vicious murderer who dismembered her victims- cut off their arms and legs- and then left them squirming and struggling atop a long, sharpened spike of wood until their own weight skewered them alive. Who burned her victims on a pyre until they were practically unrecognizable and left their charred corpses for their families and friends to find.

_That was Marie._

Nick shuddered. His eyes squeezing closed.

He could still remember it so easily. How she had smiled at him with such warmth when he read her stories to pass the time as they drove across the country. How safe and comforting it had been when she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and told him that he'd made her proud.

She'd worked so hard to make sure he never had to know what it was she was doing.

But she had to have been killing all that time, if the timeline that the news had was right. All those times she had slipped away and said she wouldn't be back until late, she had been hunting and killing and reveling in it.

And then washing the smell of burning flesh from her clothes, and coming back home with bread and a box of eggs and fixing him breakfast.

Had his parents been the same way, back when they were alive? Had each of them had their own special preference to how they killed, and gone out and done it just as casually as if they were running an errand? All those nights that dad had read him a story before bed, all those mornings mom had fussed over his hair- had they been doing it with the remnants of blood left over beneath their fingernails that they hadn't been able to scrub out?

Would he wind up doing the same?

The sick lurch in his stomach told him _no_. But the deep, gnawing, resounding hunger that pulled at him from the very core of his being- that practically screamed _Oh God **yes.**_

For all that he had made up his mind to sit by mother's side until she woke up, no matter how long it took, he belatedly realized that he couldn't bring himself to look at her.

He gave the doctor his number before he all but fled the hospital.

x

"You sure you're alright?"

"I'm fine, Wu." Nick didn't feel fine, but that was the point of all of this. Going in to work to keep himself busy, so he could distract himself from- well, _everything_.

"You know you don't have to be in here for another week, right?" Wu was keeping pace with him, shooting him faintly worried looks out of the corner of his eye. "The Captain's a hardass but he really was worried. I mean, hell, we _all_ were, but he's the only one with the handy signature that can go at the bottom of the page to file for leave. If it was me, I would take that vacation time and milk it for all its worth. Not often you've got a handy head wound to make people do stuff for you. _Hey, can you grab that for me? I would get it myself, but that means standing up, and I wouldn't want to risk a dizzy spell._ You've got to learn how to work it, man, you know the ladies love that wounded hero thing-"

"I'm fine, Wu." Nick had begun to wonder midway through that last sentence whether or not Wu would just keep talking forever if he wasn't stopped.

The Waschbar hesitated. Merciful silence reigned for a moment.

Then-

"It's not too bad, is it?" Wu asked, with a wince. "I mean, that big old crack in your egg, together with your headaches? Must be _hell_. Listen, if it's really bad, I- I mean, I know that you don't want to take a prescription and all, but I know a guy who knows a guy if you just want to be able to sleep." he lifted up his hands innocently. "Just saying."

Nick was almost surprised for a moment. Then, he finally forced himself to slow down and calm down.

When he managed to look back up at Wu, he offered as close to a smile as he could manage.

"Thanks." he shook his head. "But I really am fine. Funny thing is, seems like getting my skull rung like a bell was exactly what the doctor ordered."

"What- no more headache?" Wu's eyebrows had crept all the way up until they were threatening to achieve liftoff. His incredulity made it a little easier for Nick's smile to be genuine.

"No more headache." he concurred. "Don't know how long it'll last for, but I'm taking the opportunity to get some work done while I can. Hell, we've got a case- I can't just leave Hank hanging like that. Besides-" and he stopped.

For a moment, he felt the tug of his instincts- the lurch of an _urge_ that hurt like fish hooks had been dug into his heart and someone was yanking on them, pulling them like a puppet's strings.

For just a moment, he looked at Wu and wondered how badly the betrayal would hit him after Nick had killed his whole family and left their bits and pieces in his fridge.

For just a single moment, he wondered if Wu was more likely to scream or to cry when he was strapped down to that operating table where Nick could have his fun uninterrupted. Was he more likely to curse Nick's name, to spew hatred and scorn for for his _friend_, or was he more likely to weep and beg for his life?

Nick shoved them away.

The urges were nowhere near as bad as they had been last night. Nick had withstood far worse than just that sort of tentative, casual _shove _which tempted him to try something he would regret.

Nick shook his head. What had he been saying?

"Besides?" Wu prompted, watching Nick with a small frown of concern.

"Besides." Oh, right. That's what he had been about to say. "If I took a break, all I would do is sit by her bedside in the hospital. I'm useless there- just getting in the way. Here, there's some good I can do."

And he _could_ do good. He still _could_. He would prove that to himself.

Just because all of this had happened to him, that didn't mean his fate was inevitable.

_Yes,_ he had gone through his Becoming. _Yes,_ he had these-_ urges._

But that didn't mean his only choice in life was to drop his job and head off with mother to become the apprentice to the Charnel Queen.

There was still good in the world, and he was still capable of grasping it- still capable of being a force for good, instead of evil. He would prove that, even if he had to _stab himself_ to keep his instincts in line.

He would solve this case before any other parents had to bury their children.


	16. For the Love of God

There were two poignant questions I received after posting the last chapter which I felt particularly inclined to answer here because even though I'm going to address both of them in the story, I've thought about them extensively, and their answers are a lot more complicated than I think I can get across without shoehorning the issue in.

_Pesterfield: Is Marie a known serial killer, or did only the Reaper know she was the Charnel Queen?_

Answer: If your question is whether or not she's actively wanted by the law _by name_, no. She's still anonymous. If your question was whether or not the _Charnel Queen_ was known, hell yeah, she's just about the most famous serial killer of her time period in this universe, at least of those active in the United States. Think BTK if he had never gotten caught and just kept killing indefinitely. Honestly, even though she's so understated and easily overlooked in her everyday life, she loves to kill in a particularly flashy way when she's hunting. It's partially dependent on her signature, but also partially just because she really dislikes authority. Killing in such a visible and sensational way? She's all but thumbing her nose up at the police and FBI, to those trying to catch her. It's her little way of saying _'I am so much better than you that it's almost pitiful'_. She gets off on making the people tracking her down look like fools as much, if not more, than she enjoys the kills themselves.

(Also cue her being so utterly dismayed that Nick dreamed of becoming a cop.)

_Livia: You know, it strikes me that it must be very difficult for Nick to give or follow descriptions of suspects or victims in hi job if he does not usually see their human faces. How does he manage it?_

Excellent question. The answer is, honestly, with some difficulty. If anyone ever knew the right questions to ask Nick and he answered them truthfully, they might be able to diagnose him as legally blind.

Before he started seeing people's human faces due to his inner Grimm poking its nose out of its cocoon, the only reason why Nick knew what human beings looked like at all was because of hand-illustrated artwork. He sees everyone's woged faces in photographs, in television, in films- everywhere, in all media. Luckily, that means that if someone hands him a photo of, say, a Hundjager, he would see them in the photograph as a Hundjager, so he would be able to recognize them in the street if he met them.

If they don't have a photograph, and instead, just a sketch or a physical description of the suspect, he's a little bit more screwed. But then, you have to remember two things- one, Grimm sight in this Verse sees more than just the inner Wesen, but also basically sees the person's soul. Every scar and scab and blight is visible in a very specific way- emotional wounds appear as gouges to the heart, self esteem issues as black gunk clinging to them and slowing them down, delusions as a filmy web over the eyes preventing them from seeing the truth, ect. And Nick is very good at profiling. So if he figures out the characteristics that a suspect would have, based on their crimes and race and personality type, then if he gets within a line of sight of the suspect, he can usually pick them out just through their traits on the fly.

But sometimes he messes up. Sometimes he's expecting a cowardly Lowen and winds up finding a Mauzhertz with delusions of grandeur instead. When he runs into those situations, the thing is, he's never alone.

It's standard practice to bring backup when you're a cop or a police detective. For those 1 out of 10 situations where Nick is left floundering completely in the dark, his partner has always been there to bail him out. And because he spots so many of the rest of the suspects, nobody thinks much of it if he randomly misses one every once in a while.

He's had a lifetime of learning to cope with that weakness. And now that he can see human faces, practically a whole new world has opened up to him. It's as exciting as it is terrifying.

Also yes, in case you're wondering, I have considered this Verse a lot.

If you guys have any more questions, please feel free to ask!

* * *

Stabbing himself was sounding more and more appealing.

Not to say that he was suicidal. No way.

But after the third time he realized he was digging his pencil into his knee to stop himself from zoning out, just_ jabbing it_ in there and_ leaving it_ was beginning to sound tempting.

He was amazed that no one else had noticed how_ off_ he was at the station. Or maybe they had, and just presumed it was due to his aunt being attacked.

The captain had stopped by just long enough to glance over him, offer him condolences, tell him to write up the incident report, and inform him that he would be attending a session with the station shrink.

If only everyone else could bother being so simple and efficient. It felt like everyone he talked to, including Hank and Wu, were all walking on eggshells around him.

The tooth marks on the flesh had come back, but were inconclusive as to species. Nick had been the one to slip in a recommendation that they test saliva for DNA, but that would take nearly another full day.

In the meantime, he had a lead that he couldn't fully explore without an excuse or an explanation. And it was driving him mad.

Blutbad weren't exactly_ rare_, that was the thing. In terms of population, they were definitely among the less endangered races out there.

The only reason why they didn't usually turn up everywhere was because their brutality drove them away from just settling down the way that most other races could. They tended to be transient by nature- getting in bar brawls, roaming around from rest stop to rest stop, providing either patronage or tips for clubs and concerts.

That was healthy for a Blutbad. That sort of behavior suited them, and while they might be a bit wild, it allowed them to work out their urges and instincts in a healthy and even productive way.

Lieutenant Keene bumped into the edge of Nick's chair as he walked past, and Nick found that he was twisting the pencil into his leg again in an attempt to stop himself from reaching out and grabbing the man's throat and squeezing and watching the light leave his eyes-

Nick took a deep breath. This- this was going to be harder than he'd thought. This wasn't like just withstanding his headache- that had been something that he just had to live with, had to put up with, something that had no cure. He'd been dead wrong when he'd presumed that living with his own instincts would be no different.

Sitting here in the middle of the station, all he could think of when he looked at anyone for too long was how best to flay them alive.

Was he like the Blutbaden were? Was there some kind of- lifestyle choice which would make it easier to deal with his new problem?

Or was his situation completely unique?

From what mother had said, it seemed like there weren't any other Grimms who had both managed to pull away from their bloodlust during their Becoming and still killed on their first night. So what did that mean? Those who succumbed to that homicidal lust- it seemed like it just broke something inside of them, like killing an innocent in cold blood set the bar for how their life was meant to play out. And those who didn't succumb- they turned into those mindless monsters, didn't they? The ones mother had warned him about.

An impossible choice between the lesser of two evils. Picking between consciously becoming a murderer and accepting the inevitability of the homicidal urges, being plagued by it for the rest of your life, or else pushing them away, refusing to pick the easy way out- and then losing everything that made you who you were, and still killing countless others, but never having any control over yourself ever again.

No wonder Grimms tended towards incarceration or the death penalty.

Nick shook his head. Checked the time on his phone.

He needed to get out of here. He needed to get up, to stand, to _move_. He needed to do _something._

With an offhand remark to Hank that he was going back to the park to check it out and stretch his legs, his partner agreed, all too grateful to get out of the station and stop beating their heads against false leads. Nick slipped the pencil into his pocket as they stood. Who knew if he would need it later?

Nick didn't notice the way the captain's gaze followed him as they headed for the exit, shrugging on their coats.

x

"Okay, so I presume this is something incredibly clever that'll give us our big break, but seriously? Hide and seek?"

"Shut up." Nick shot back at Hank. He meant it good-naturedly, but it may have come out a little more aggravated than he'd intended for it to. He shifted to the next spot. "Can you see me here?"

"Yeah." Hank sighed. He'd been positioned on the trail in approximately the place where they'd determined that Sylvie Oster had been attacked, and now Nick was trying to get an idea of where the Blutbad had been hiding.

Nick moved to the next spot.

"Here?" he called.

"Again, yeah." Hank called back. "Dude, your elbows are poking out."

He folded them in. A pause, but then-

"Now your shadow's plastered all up against the other tree."

"Would it have been early in the morning, though?" Nick wondered. Hank considered it.

"Guess not." he admitted.

Nick moved out of hiding. He considered Hank, frowning thoughtfully.

"Oh, come on, man." Hank shot him a grin. "I can practically see the smoke coming out of your ears. What is it?"

"Well, it's just..." he paused. Then- "That spot is the only one nearby that actually gives halfway decent cover, but it's still so far away. I would almost want to say that something dropped onto her from above if there had been any trees overhanging the path, but we're out of luck. Instead, there's this one spot, but- come on, Hank, you and I trade places. I need to use your legs."

"You got it." Hank sounded sort of amused as he walked over to the tree and Nick took his place on the path. "What do I need to do?"

"Presuming there was a blitz attack, I need you to take a run at me from there, fast as you possibly can." Nick explained. He didn't want to admit that the reason why he didn't want to do it himself was because he wasn't sure what he would do if he lunged for Hank. It was going to be bad enough that Hank was lunging for him.

He was glad he'd been able to bolster himself against it, if only a little bit. When Hank broke free from the tree line, powerful strides driving him towards Nick like a champion horse from the gate, it took everything he had not to draw his gun.

Hank only slowed down one or two steps away. Nick had stuck both hands in his pockets, digging his nails into his palms to keep himself from reaching out and grabbing Hank.

"How was that?" Hank asked, cheerfully. Nick nodded, shoving the fight-or-flight charged desire to lash out back down under the surface.

"Bad." he admitted. "I mean, you were good, but there's bad news."

"Uh-oh." Hank's face fell. "What?"

"I don't think we're dealing with an animal."

Hank's frown darkened. Nick grimaced.

"You at top speed trumps any kind of wild animal's lunge, but with the distance between that spot and here, I still had plenty of opportunity to register that you were coming at me and run off the other direction. She might not have been a professional runner, but she would have at least been able to put some distance between her and her attacker. That is, unless she wasn't aware of it until it was too late."

"But why does that mean it wasn't an animal?" Hank was confused. "I mean, I'm not arguing- this has felt like too much of an organized attack right from the start, and animals don't care about using counter-forensics measures to hide the shape of their bite- but a critter can do an ambush just as well as a person can."

Nick shot him a small smile. Hank. He knew there was a reason why he liked Hank so much.

"You tell me." he pressed.

The Skalenzahne frowned until Nick pretended to tug at his earlobe. Then, his eyes lit up in realization.

"She had those headphones in." he had remembered. "Which means that if she had her back turned, she wouldn't hear the footsteps. But an animal wouldn't have known that- would have waited for her to get closer to their hiding spot before attacking, trying to get the upper hand. But she runs this path every day, and her roommate says she takes the bus back, which means that she only ever runs one direction down this path. But it attacked her on the approaching side, instead of waiting for her to round the bend and potentially showing her back to it."

It was all Nick could do not to cheer for him.

"Gold star, man." he grinned. "And because she had those headphones in, her only potential way of noticing she was getting attacked was visually. And because it attacked her on the approaching side instead of waiting for a better target of opportunity, and that she didn't run away, what can we presume about her vision?"

"It was impaired somehow." Hank was frowning. "I don't know how that's possible, but-"

Nick pulled the pencil out of his pocket and threw it against the nearby tree where it cracked with a loud snap.

Hank jumped, his head jerking to the side to see what it was.

When he turned back to Nick, Hank's eyebrows were arched all the way up.

"A distraction?" Hank lifted his fingers to his neck to check his pulse. "Christ, man, you freaked me out."

"Animals don't often use distractions when there are far easier methods of hunting available to them." Nick pointed out, ignoring Hank's complaint.

"So," Hank concluded, his eyes narrowing. "Unless we get proven otherwise, we should go at this presuming that we're investigating a homicide made to look like an animal attack. Joy."

_Success._

At least Nick managed not to punch the air in victory.

x

Nick and Hank spend the rest of the day compiling a list of people who might have held a grudge against Sylvie Oster.

It was procedure, even if it was most likely a waste of time.

Unfortunately, as Nick stood outside the station with the lab's promise to have the sample finished and ready by tomorrow morning still ringing in his ears, he found himself wishing that the slow going on the case was the worst thing he had to handle.

He wanted to go to his new house and handcuff himself to a pipe in the basement in order to just relax and let go and let his instincts run free and know he wouldn't hurt anyone, but without someone to uncuff him in the morning, he might be better off booking himself into lockup at the station for how helpful it would be.

None the less, he just wanted to go and sleep and make the morning come sooner, but none of his furniture had been moved to his new house yet. He could go back to his apartment, but that would mean facing Calyssa and the Garretts, which would have meant explaining not only the tension between himself and mother, but also the fact that she was currently in the hospital.

He could go visit her at the hospital. See if she had woken up yet. But he didn't think he was ready for that. He wasn't ready to face her. Even if she was still unconscious, the only thing that he would get out of seeing her was guilt.

Guilt for letting her get hurt. Guilt for saving her, for not letting the Reaper exact justice. Guilt for even considering it an _option_. Guilt for killing the Reaper who had been trying to do _right_, trying to stop someone who was a_ monster_ in his eyes, trying to spare future victims from her sadistic wrath- all the Reaper had been trying to do was be a _hero_...

He wondered what had happened to the Reaper's scythe. Nobody had asked him about it. It seemed like the sort of thing that would catch people's attention- his aunt, getting attacked by what was very visibly the weapon of the Order of the Reapers. But in his daze to get to the hospital, he couldn't even remember what had happened to it.

Maybe it had gotten lost, kicked to the side and forgotten. Maybe they had their hands on it right now, and internal investigations was looking into his family history. Maybe they had found where he had stashed the mask in the attic and someone waiting for him at home right now to arrest him.

That was how Nick found himself wandering the streets, his hands in his pockets.

What was he supposed to do? Had he acted wrongly? Should he have let mother be killed?

No, instead, she was just paralyzed and comatose. Even if she woke up, she would never kill again. She would never hunt again.

She might consider that even _worse_ than death.

The nurses in the hospital had asked him about her scars. About the damage done to her that had stayed with her, each mark telling a story that would never be spoken, much less understood...

Not except by another Grimm.

How could a Grimm hope to be understood, except by one of their own kind? If he ever tried to describe the instincts- the urges- to someone else, what would they hear? They would think he was crazy.

And _wasn't_ it crazy? _Crazy,_ to look at someone and imagine how their blood would taste, how they would scream, how they would squirm...

It didn't even make him feel sick anymore. More numb to it, as though the constant barrage of savage lust battering against his conscience had caused his heart to barricade itself off to try and prevent the damage from spreading.

Or maybe his conscience was gone. Maybe it had died along with what was left of his sanity during his Becoming. Maybe those last pangs of ethics and morals had been just an echo, and this was how he was supposed to feel. Just numb.

Nick fell to a halt. His tortured thoughts had led his feet down a pathway that he knew, but had never walked before.

Now, as he stood in the courtyard, staring up at the tall steeple in front of him, a tug of unfamiliarity overcame him. The cross stared down at him from the very top of the building, wrought iron, looming ominously.

He had never been in a church before in his life.

Was it even open? Did churches close? Did they have some kind of operating hours?

There were lights on inside, though. A warm honey glow against the inside of the windows.

Hesitantly, Nick walked up to the door and tested the handle.

It swung open easily in his hands.

And this was it. His moment of decision. He didn't even really know why he was here.

_Redemption_, maybe. That was what the men of the cross were good at, wasn't it?_ Redemption._

Or maybe _confession._

He still didn't know which one he was looking for as he hesitated in the doorway, trying to convince himself to either _go in_ or _go home._

The second one finally won out.

Nick sighed, letting the door fall back closed. He turned around, shoving his hands back in his pockets, ready to walk back to his apartment.

And nearly ran smack into someone behind him.

His instincts _flared_. Every cell in his body screamed that he was being _hunted_, that he was going to be hurt, to be ambushed, to be _killed_-

Nick saw fur, and red eyes, and his brain- worn out from thinking about Blutbaden suspects all day- only registered _enemy_.

He reacted before he could act.

Nick ripped his hands free from his pockets and lunged, tackling the beast to the ground, his fingers wrapping around the wretched monster's throat.

They met white cloth.

Nick froze. Staring down blindly at his would-be victim.

A priest was staring back up at him, wide-eyed in shock.

Nick tore himself away from the man, scrambling back. The beast's facade face superimposed itself over his fur and fangs, leaving him looking benign and bewildered and only slightly terrified.

Nick was about to lean forward- to apologize- to offer his hand, to protest that the priest had startled him- but the second he reached out, his instincts screamed **_kill_ **again with such ferocity that he felt _dizzy_.

"I'm sorry." Nick managed to choke out, even as he pushed himself to his feet. "Please- please forgive me."

He ran.

He barely even heard the man's cry of "_Wait-!_" from behind him.


End file.
